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ii 



TILL HE COME." 



BY 



JAMES H.i'''BROOKES. 



Author of Is the Bible True? Is the Bible Inspired? Did Jesus Rist? 

Maranatha; From Death Unto Life; The Holy Spirit; 

Mystery o/ Sufferings etc. 




GOSPKL PUBLISHING COMPANY, 
Arcade Court, Chicago, 111, 



\ 




Copyright, 189', 



GOSPEL PUBLISHING COMPANY. 



11 9F COKC! :.^s' 



PREFACE. 

It is the aim of tliis little book to set forth the 
truth of Cxod concerning the second com ino; of His 
Son. No doul)t there are a thousand who to-chxy 
accept the truth, and are ''looking for that blessed 
hope " where there was one twenty-five years ago. 
But there are thousands more who probably have 
never heard it mentioned. It has dropped out of 
the preaching and teaching of most men as com- 
pletely as if it had no place in the inspired 
Scriptures. 

It may be that the Holy Spirit will own the 
testimony here borne to awaken some of God's 
deal- children to the study of a subject of vast 
practical importance. At all events, if they will 
read these few pages, they can see an outline of 
the faith held by those who heed the Master's 
command, "What I say unto you, I say unto all, 
AVatch; " and they can also see "a reason of the 
hope" that sliines more .brightly and beautifully, 
as we move on throuorhincreasi no; darkness and tem- 
pest and temptation " to meet the Lord in the air." 

St. Louis, June, 1891. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 



The Apostles' Teaching, - . , . y 

Our Lord's Teaching, 19 

His Coming May be Near, - - - 29 

The Present Age, - - - ' - - - 38 

The End of the Age, - - . - 46 

Parables of Matthew XIII - - 53 

Antichrist, -.,... 61 

ISkAEL, - 75 

The Rapture, - - - - - - 87 

That Blessed Hope, ----- 97 

The Only Hope, . . _ . _ 106 

A Practical Hope, - - - - - 124 

\ViTN esses to the Hoi^e, - - - 134 

The Order of Even is, - - - - 149 



TILL HE COME. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE apostles' TEACHING. 

OUR risen Lord had appeared on many occa- 
sions to His disciples, '' to whom He pre- 
sented Himself living after his suffering, by many 
infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, 
and speaking of the things pertaining to the King- 
dom of God." This naturally led them to ask of 
Him, " Lord, wilt Thou at this time restore again 
the Kindom to LsraeL!; And he said unto them, 
It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, 
which the Father hath placed in Llis own author- 
ity." As Jews, familiar with their prophets, they 
expected the cessation of Gentile dominion, and 
the restoration of the Kingdom to Israel; and the 
Lord gave them no hint that their expectation was 
vain, but only that it was not for them to know 
the times or seasons, which, in the oftice work of 
re;lemption undertaken l)y the persons of the God- 
head, specially fell under the authority of the 
Father. 

Then followed the promise of the gift and power 
of the IIolv Ghost, and the great commission, ''Ye 



8 TILL HE COME. 



shall be witnesses unto me, hotli in Jerusalem, and 
in all Jndea, and in Samaria, and nnto the utter- 
most part of the earth. And when he had spoken 
these things, while they beheld. He was taken up; 
and a cloud received Him out of their sight. And 
while they looked steadfastly toward heaven, as He 
went np, behold, two men stood by them in w^hite 
apparel; which also said. Ye men of Galilee, why 
stand ye gazing np into heaven? This same Jesus, 
which is taken up from yon iiito heaven, shall so 
come in like manner as ye have seen IHm go into 
heaven. Then returned they nnto elerusalem from 
the mount called Olivet, which is from Jerusalem 
a Sabbath day's journey." Luke adds in his 
Gospel, ''They worshipped Him, and returned to 
Jerusalem wdtli great joy." Lu., xxiv:52. 

We are not told who these two men were, but it 
is worthy of notice that the same inspired writer 
mentions the appearing of two men in white at 
two other momentous periods in the earthly history 
of our Lord. On the mount of transfiguration, 
"as He prayed, the fashion of His countenance 
was altered, and His raiment was white and 
glistening. And, behold, there talked with Him 
two men, which were Moses and Elias; who ap- 
peared in glory, and spake of IHs exodus which 
He should accomplish at Jerusalem." Lu., ix:29- 
31. On the morning of the resurrection, when the 
women w^ent to the sepulchre to anoint the body 
of their crucified Lriend, " they found the stone 
rolled away from the sepulchre. And they entered 
in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus. 
And it came to pass, as they were much perplexed 
thereabout, beliold. two men stood by them in 



shilling garments: and as tliey were afraid, and 
bowed down tlieir faces to tlie earth, they said nnto 
them, " A¥hy seek ye the living One among the 
dead?" Ln., xxiv:2-5. 

It is not an improbal)le conjectnre, tlierefore, 
tliat tlie same t-wo men in wliite or histrons cloth- 
ing who spake of His exodus at Jernsalem, and 
who heralded His exodus from the tomb, were also 
sent to proclaim Ilis second coming. Nor is it 
improbable that the same two men in wliite are the 
two witnesses who shall appear during the dreadful 
raign of the Antichrist; "and they shall prophesy 
a thousand two hundred and three score days, 
clotlied in sackcloth." Rev. xi:3. But whoever 
the messengers niay have been, whether Moses and 
Elias, or angels in human form, the message itself 
was of sufHcient importance to summon them from 
heaven, and it forms one of the three great an- 
nouncements — the death, the resurrection, and the 
return of the Lord to the earth. Nor is it possible 
to mistake its meaning. This same Jesus wdio 
bore the marks of the nails in His hands and of 
the spear wound in His side; this same Jesus who 
said to IHs disciples, "• Handle me, and see; for a 
spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have;" 
this same Jesus who ate and talked with them; 
this same Jesus who ascended from tlieir midst 
bodily, and personally and visibly, " this same 
Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, 
shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him 
go into heaven." 

Bengel has well said, "Between His ascension 
and His coming in glory, no event intervenes equal 
in importance to each of these two events. There- 



10 TILL HE COME. 



lore these two are joined togetlier, and it accords 
with the majesty of Christ that during the whole 
period between His ascension and His advent He 
should without intermission be expected." Rev. 
A. Maclaren, D. D., of Manchester, England, one 
of the ablest and most accomplished among living 
expositors, truly remarks, " He Avill ' so come in 
like manner as ' He has crone. We are not to water 
down such words as these with anything short of 
a return precisely corresponding in its method to 
the departure; and as the departure was visible, 
corporeal, literal, personal and local, so, too, will 
be His return from heaven to earth. And He 
will come as He went, a visible manhood, only 
thronged, amidst the clouds of heaven, with powder 
and great gh)ry. This is tlie aim that He sets 
before IHm in His departure; He goes in order 
that He may come back again." 

Hence we are not surprised to find that the 
prediction and promise of the two men in white 



became a prominent theme in the preaching of the 
apostles. Thus a few^ days after the ascension, 
Peter said to the people, " Repent ye, therefore, 
and be converted, that your sins may be blotted 
out, so that tlie times of refresliinor shall come from 
the presence of the Lord; and He shall send Jesus 
Christ, which before was preached unto you: whom 
the heaven must receive until tlie times of restitu- 
tion of all things, which God hath spoken by the 
mouth of all His holy prophets since the world 
beoan." Acts, iii:19-2i. The heaven, then, must 
give back Jesus at the times of the restitution of 
all things, and this has been the subject of divine 
revelation tlirough the prophets since the world 



TEACHING. 11 



began. It is wild exegesis whicli imagines tliat 
the heaven must receive Him until the end of the 
times of the restitution of all thiiigs. If a friend 
writes to another that he Avill stay where he is until 
Spring, it would be foolish to fancy that lie means 
until the end of Spring. But the exegesis proves 
too much, for if Christ will not come until the end 
of the times of the restitution of all things, he will 
not come at all, since the times of tlie restitution 
of all things include the final judgment, and the 
new heavens and new earth. It is obvious to every 
unprejudiced reader that Christ comes from heaven 
to inauD-urate and introduce these times. 

The possil)le nearness of this personal return 
from heaven is shown by the fact that in the first 
epistle Paul was directed l)y the Holy Spirit to 
write, he does not hesitate to describe the Thessa- 
lonians as those who had ^' turned to God from 
idols, to serve the living and true God ; and to wait 
for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from 
the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the 
wrath to come." 1 Tliess., i:9, 10. That this is a 
personal return cannot 1)e doubted, for neither the 
Holy Spirit, nor death, nor the destruction of 
Jerusalem, nor any other providential event is ever 
called Jesus, nor were they raised from the dead, 
nor did they deliver us from the wrath to come. 
It is certain, therefore, that believers eighteen 
hundred years ago were taught by inspiration to 
wait for God's Son from heaven. 

Then comes another statement in the next chap- 
ter: ''What is our hope, or joy, or crown of re- 
joicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our 
Lord Jesus Christ at His coming ?" 1 Thess., ii :19. 



12 TILL HE COME. 



Then comes another statement in the next chapter: 
"The Lord make yon to increase and ahonnd in 
love one toward another, and toward all men, even 
as we do toward yon: to the end He may stablish 
yonr hearts nid)lamable in lioliness before God, 
even onr Father, at tlie cominor of the Lord Jesns 
Christ with all His saints." I Tliess., iii:12- 
13. Then comes another statement in the 
next chapter: "The Lord Himself shall de- 
scend from heaven with a shont." 1 Tliess., iv:16. 
No one pretends to make ont of these passages 
anything except a literal and personal retnrn of 
Jesus, and the ingenuity of the keenest criticism 
fails to discover a reference in them to any other 
event whatsoever. 

Then comes another statement in the next chap- 
ter: "Of the times and tlie seasons, brethren, ye 
have no need that I write unto you. For your- 
selves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so 
Cometh as a thief in the night." 1 Thess., v:l, 
2. How did the Thessalonians, who had but re- 
cently turned to God from idols, know this so 
perfectly? Plainly because the Apostle during his 
brief visit had taught it to them. It was .not, 
then, a subject of no practical value in his estima- 
tion, as so often affirmed now, and it cannot be 
right to dismiss it from the field of contemplation 
and discussion, as preachers and people generally 
do at present. No matter whether he is a pre- 
millenialist or post-millenialist, every ambassa- 
dor for Christ is bound to testify of the Lord's 
personal return from heaven; and to substitute 
tor it the manifestation of the Spirit's power, the 
progress of the church, or the advance of Christian 



THE apostles' TEACHINa. 13 

civilization, is a dangerous and deplorable depart- 
ure from the truth of God. Well may we join 
in the apostle's prayer, " The very God of peace 
sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole 
spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless at 
the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Thess., 
v:23. 

Turning now to the second epistle to the Thessa- 
lonians, and the second the apostle was inspired to 
write, we find the same great truth prominently 
brought forth. Thus to tlie persecuted Christians 
it is said in the first chapter, "To you who are 
troubled rest with us when the Lord Jesus shall be 
revealed from heaven witli His miglity angels, in 
flaming Are taking vengeance on them that know 
not God, and that obey not tlie gospel of our Lord 
Jesus Christ, who shall be punished with everlast- 
ing destruction from tlie presence of the Lord, and 
from the glory of His power, when He shall come 
to be glorifled in His saints, and to be admired in 
all them that believe (because our testimony among 
you was believed) in that day." 

In the second chapter he says, '^ jS ow we beseech 
you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, and by our gathering together unto Him, 
that ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, 
neither by spirit, noi- l)y woi'd, nor l)y letter as 
from us, as that the day of the Lord is at hand," 
or '' is now present," as the lievised Version 
renders it; or '^hath arrived," as Dr. Young trans- 
lates it; or " is come," as Alford gives it; or " has 
set in," according -to liotherham. Our post-mill- 
ennial lirethren tell us we are solemnly forbidden 
to believe that *' tlie Lord is at hand"; but surely 



14 TILL HE COME. 



they forget that the same Holy Spirit, by the same 
apostle, elsewhere declares that "the Lord is at 
hand." Phil., iv:5. Would they make the in- 
spired writer contradict himself in this fashion? 
l5r. John Lillie in his admirable lectures on tlie 
epistle truly says, "The phrase is at hand occurs 
twenty times elsewhere in the New Testament, 
and not once does it stand for the Greek word so 
rendered here. The word translated is at hand 
occurs seven times, and is always rendered ' is 
present ' but once." It is simply impossible that 
tliose who w^ere taught in the iirst epistle to look 
with delight for the coming of Christ, could be 
violently agitated by the thought that he might be 
at hand. Their trouble arose from a rumor that 
He had returned to the earth, and if this was 
true they knew that tliey liad not l)een caught up 
in clouds to meet Him in the air, and hence their 
distress was extreme, as the Greek implies. 

In the third chapter the apostle writes, ^^The 
Lord direct your hearts into the love of God, and 
into the patient waiting for Christ," or " into the 
patience of Clirist," wlio is patiently waiting the 
times and seasons which the Father hatli put 
under His own authority. So overshadowing is 
the doctrine of our Lord's second coming in the 
two epistles, it is not strange that the translators 
of our common version speak of " the patient 
waiting for Christ." It is the theme of every 
chapter, and no one pretends that the passages 
(juoted refer to anytliiug l)ut His personal advent. 
It is impossible that any one of them was designed 
to teach the destruction of Jerusalem, or the de- 
scent of the Spirit, or the death of the believer. 



THE Ar(3STLp:s' TEACHING. 15 

It is surely also His personal coming that is in 
view when the same apostle writes to the Corinth- 
ians, ''Ye come behind in no gift, waiting for the 
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ," 1 Cor. i:7; 
"Therefore iudge nothincr before the time, until 
the Lord come," 1 Cor. iv:5; "As often as ye eat 
this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show the 
Lord's death till He come." 1 Cor. xi:26. All 
expositors no doubt w^ould fully agree with Dr. 
Charles Hodge on the first of these passages: "The 
second advent of Christ, so clearly predicted by 
Himself and by His apostles, connected as it is 
with the promise of the resurrection of His people 
and the consumation of His kingdom, was the 
object of longing expectation to all the early 
Clu-istia,ns. So great is the glory connected with 
that event that Paul in Rom. viii:18-23, not only 
represents all present afttictions as trifling in com- 
parison, but describes the whole creation as looking 
forward to it with earnest expectation. Comp. 
Pliil. iii:20; Tit. ii:13. So general was this ex- 
pectation that Christians were characterized as those 
' who love His appearing,' 2 Tim. iv:8, and as those 
'who wait for Him.' Heb. ix:28." 

Mr. Barnes, too, certainly expresses the views of 
all kinds and classes of commentators, when he 
says on the same verse, " The earnest expectation 
of the Lord Jesus became one of the marks of early 
Christian piety. This return was promised by the 
"Saviour to His anxious disciples when He w^as about 
to leave them. Jno. xiv:3. The promise was re- 
newed when he ascended to lieaven. Acts i:ll. 
It became the settled hope and expectation of 
Christians that He would return. Tit. ii:13; 2 



16 TILL HE COME. 



Pet. iii:12; Heb. ix:28. And with earnest prayer 
that He would quickly come, John closes the 
volume of inspiration. Rev. xxii:20." Both of 
these eminent expositors were post-millenialists, 
as is Prof. Beet who says of the words here ex- 
pounded, " The Corinthians already possessed 
spiritual gifts which were a proof of God's favor; 
while at the same time they were eagerly looking 
forward to that day when Jesus will visibly appear 
to bring in the linal glory." Upon the next verse 
he remarks, '' To the clay of Christ's return the 
early Christians looked forward, as Israel did ages 
before to the day of Jehovah." 

But leaving for the present the inspired writings 
of Paul, it will be found that each of the apostles 
dwells upon the great subject of our Lord's per- 
sonal return. Thus James says, "Be patient there- 
fore, brethren, unto the comino- of the Lord." Jas. 
iv:7. Peter writes to his brethren, '^that the trial 
of your faitlj being much more precious than of 
gold that perisheth, though it be tried with lire, 
might be found unto praise and honor and glory 
at the appearing of Jesus Christ," 1 Pet. i:7; 
"looking for and hastening the coming of the day 
of God, or as the Revised renders it, " earnestly 
desiring the coming." 2 Pet. iii:12. John says, 
"And now, little children, abide in Him; that, 
when he shall appear, we may have conhdence, and 
not be ashamed before Him at His coming." 1 
John ii :28. J ude says, '* Enoch also, the seventh 
from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, behold 
the Lord conieth with ten thousands of His saints," 
Jude 14; and John opens the Apocalypse with the 
announcement, " IJehold, lie cometh with clouds, 



THE AroSTLES' TEACHING. 17 

and every eye shall see Him, and they also which 
pierced Him, and all kindreds of the earth shall 
wail because of Him. Even so. Amen." Rev. i:7. 

Not a text thus far quoted can be forced to refer, 
even by the wildest license of the most audacious 
criticism, to any event whatever except the literal 
and personal return of the Lord Jesus. The 
thoughtless habit of skimming over such testimony 
with a passing impression that it may relate to 
death, or the destruction of Jerusalem, or the out- 
pouring of the Spirit, or some striking providential 
event, is little less than triHing with the sacred 
Scriptures, and betokens a state of mind far from 
intelligent, and a condition of heart far from re\'- 
erential. If Christians will ask themselves why 
they believe that Jesus was born, that He per- 
formed miracles and uttered the sayings ascribed 
to Him, that He died upon the cross and rose 
from the grave, they can easily see that they have 
precisely the same evidence, only multiplied ten- 
fold, to convince them of His coming again. 

It is the one object set before us, the " one hope 
of your calling." Eph. iv:4. As Graham on Eplies- 
ians, a capital book issued by the Presbyterian 
Board of Publication, well says on these words, all 
other hopes are "united in the one great hope 
which has animated tlie church from the beginning 
— the hope of the coming and kingdom of Jesns 
Christ, which is therefore called, by way of emi- 
nence, 'that blessed hope.' Tit. ii:13. I think, 
therefore, that this is the one hope of our callirig, 
and includes all the others. The Jews had the 
coming of Christ in the flesh as their great nation- 
al hope, and w^e Christians look for His coming in 



18 TILL HE COME. 



glory as the substance of things hoped for. This 
is the hope of the New Testament as distinguished 
from that of the Old, and the Gospels and Epistles 
are full of it. It animated the early Christians in 
their contendings, it is embodied in the Lord's 
Prayer, it is the cry of the widowed church and 
the groaning creation: Come, Lord Jesus, come 
quickly. . . . The cross and the crown, the 
coming of Christ in tlie flesh and His coming in 
glory, being the historical and the prophetical, and 
so the proper food for memory and hope, are the 
two centres of the divine word and the divine ad- 
ministration around which all the systems of grace 
and providence revolve. There is one faith in the 
dying Lamb, and one hope in the coming King." 

" For the vision of the Bridegoom 
Waits the well-beloved Bride, 
Severed only for a season 
From her well-beloved's side. 
For the hour when morn ascendetb 
And the shadows disappear, 
For the signs of heavenly glory, 
She is waiting, waiting here. 

For the coming of the Bridegroom, 
Whom, though yet unseen, we love; 
For the King of Saints, returning 
In His glory from above; 
For the shout that shakes the prison 
For the trumpet loud and clear, 
For the voice of the archangel, 
She is waiting, waiting here. 

For the light beyond the darkness, 
When the reign of sin is done; 
When the storm has ceased its raging, 
And the haven Jias been won; 
For the joy beyond the sorrow, 
Joy of the eternal year, 
For the resurrection splendor, 
She is waiting, waiting here!" 



OUR LORDS TEACHING. 



19 



CHAPTER II. 



OUR LORD S TEACHING. 



IT is wortliy of notice tliat the chapter in which 
our Lord hrst announces His purpose to build 
His church also contains His first distinct promise 
to return to earth. ''The Son of man shall come 
in the glory of his Father, with His angels; and 
then He shall reward every man according to his 
works." Matt. xvi:27. Not even by the wildest 
flicrht of the imao-ination can these words be made 
to refer to the destruction of Jerusalem, to the 
descent of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, to 
death, or to any, providential event whatever, be- 
cause at none of these times has He come in the 
glory of His Father, with His angels, to rew^ard 
every man according to his works. Whatever 
meaning, therefore, may be attached to His second 
coming in certain other passages, no one will pre- 
tend that in His earliest testimony upon this great 
subject He taught other than His literal and 
personal advent. 

The same thing is true of His next positive 
teaching with regard to His second advent. The 
apostles, who had forsaken all to follow Him, 
wished to know what reward they should receive; 
" and Jesus said unto them, Yerily I say unto you, 
That ye which have followed me, in the regenera- 
tion, when the Son of man shall sit in the throne 



20 



TILL HE COME. 



of His glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones 
judging the twelve tribes of Israel." Matt. xix:28. 
Surely no one will claim that this promise was 
fulfilled at the destruction of Jerusalem, or on the 
day of Pentecost, or at the death of the apostles, 
or at any time in the past, because the apostles 
have not yet sat on twelve thrones, judging the 
twelve tribes of Israel, nor has the regeneration, 
the renovation of the world, yet occurred. It looks 
forward to a glorious change on the earth, for the 
twelve tribes of Israel are found only on the earth, 
a change so splendid it is called the regeneration, 
or new birth, which occurs at "the times of resti- 
tution of all things," when the Son of man shall 
sit in the throne of his glory, and associate the 
apostles as princes with Himself in the adminis- 
tration of His Kingdom. 

Nov can his next allusion to His coming be per- 
verted to mean anything else than His literal and 
personal return. He answers the question of His 
disciples concerning the sign of His coming, and 
of the end of the age, by telling them that during 
the interval of His absence, "nation shall rise 
against nation, and kingdom against kingdom ; and 
there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earth- 
quakes, in divers places. All these are the be- 
ginning of sorrows." There is the most striking 
parallel between the testimony of our Lord in His 
Olivet discourse and the testimony of the Spirit at 
the opening of the seals. (1). '- Many shall come 
in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive 
many." Matt. xxiv:5. "And I saw, and beheld 
a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow, 
and a crown was given unto him [the stej)hanos 



21 

of man, not the dladetus of Christ in Rev. xix:12]: 
and he went forth conqnering and to conquer," the 
Antichrist. Rev. vi:2. (2). ^' And ye shall hear 
of wars, and rumors of wars: see that ye be not 
troubled: for all these things must come to pass, 
but the end is not yet." Matt. xxiv:6. "And 
there went out another horse that was red: and 
power was given to him that sat thereon to taken 
peace from the earth, and that they should kill one 
another: and there was given unto him a great 
sword." Rev. vi:4. (3). "And there shall be 
famines." Matt. xxiv:7. "And I beheld, and lo, 
a black horse; and he that sat on liim had a pair of 
balances in his hand, and I heard a voice in the 
midst of the four living creatures, saying, A mea- 
sure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of 
barley for a penny." Rev. vi:6. (4). "And pesti- 
lences and earthquakes in divers places." Matt. 
xxiv:7. Of the rider on the ghastly horse, whose 
name is Death, followed by Hell, it is said, " Pow- 
er was given unto them over the fourth part of the 
earth to kill wdth the sw^ord, and with hunger, and 
wdth death, and with the beasts of the earth." 
Rev. vi:8. (5). " Then they shall deliver you up 
to be aitiicted, and shall kill you." Matt. xxiv:9. 
" And when He had opened the Fifth Seal, I saw 
under the altar the souls of them that were slain 
foi the Word of God, and for the testimony which 
they held." Rev. vi:9, (6). "Immediately after 
the tribulation of those days shall the sun be dark- 
ened, and the moon shall not give her light, and 
the stars shall fall from heaven." Matt. xxiv:29. 
And I beheld when He had opened the Sixth Seal, 
and lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun 



22 



TILL HE COME. 



became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon 
became as blood ; and the stars of heaven fell unto 
the earth." Rev. vi:12. (7). "And He shall send 
His angels with a great sound of a trumpet; and 
they shall gather together His elect from the four 
winds, from one end of heaven to the other." 
Matt. xxiv:31. " And He cried with a loud voice 
to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt 
the earth and the sea, saying, Hurt not the earth, 
neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed 
the servants of our God in their foreheads. And 
I heard the number of them that were sealed: and 
there were sealed an hundred and forty and four 
thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel." 
Rev. vii:2-8. Truly, "all these are the beginning 
of sorrows." The word for sorrows here means 
travailing pangs ^ issuing at last in the regenera- 
tion or new birth, but meanwhile going on to a 
" great tribulation, such as was not since the be- 
ginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever 
shall be." 

"Immediately after the tribulation of those 
days " — not two thousand nor one thousand years 
after, but immediately after — " shall the sun be 
darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, 
and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the 
powders of the heavens shall be shaken, and then 
shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven; 
and then shall all the tril)es of the earth mourn, 
and they shall see the Son of man coming in the 
clouds of heaven, with power and great glory. And 
He shall send His angels with a great sound of a 
trumpet; and they shall gather together His elect 
from the four winds, from cue end of heaven to 



OUR lord's teaching. 23 

tlie otlier." Matt. xxiv:29 31. Since it is certain 
that none of these events occnrred at the clestrnc- 
tion of Jernsaleni by Titns, nor on the day of 
Pentecost, nor at the death of Christians, it is 
equally certain that when, onr Lord says all the 
tribes of the earth shall see Ilini coniintr in the 

o 

clouds of heaven. He refers to His literal, per- 
sonal and visible advent. 

In like nianner He says, " When the Son of man 
shall come in His glory, and all. the holy angels* 
with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of 
His glory: and before Him shall be gathered all 
nations." Matt. xxv:31. It may be objected that 
it is a ^vaste of time to quote passages, that are so 
obvious in their bearing upon His literal coming 
no one disputes their teaching for a moment. But 
the question is, wdiy accept these as literal, and put 
a figurative meaning upon passages that are equal- 
ly explicit in teaching His personal advent? For 
example, we constantly hear at funerals, or read in 
funeral discourses, the admonition of our Saviour, 
'' Be ye therefore ready also: for the Son of man 
Cometh at an hour when ye think not." Luk. 
xii:40. Kine Christians out of ten have no thought 
connected with tliese words beyond the necessity 
of readiness for death, because they have been so 
instructed. But why associate them with death 
any more than in other passages that, confessedly, 
contain no allusion to death? The Lord is not 
here referring to death, even in the most distant 
way, but to His personal return, which formed 
the most prominent theme of His meditation and 
discourse. If the verses that contain allusion to it 
in the four gospels are counted, it will be found 



24 



TILL HE COME. 



that it occupied His attention more than any other 
one subject; and surely Ave should give to His 
language its natural and obvious meaning. 

It would be well to remember this Avhen we read 
the familiar words, ' ' If I go and pi-epare a place 
for you, I will come again, and receive you unto 
myself; that wdiere I am, there ye may be also." 
Jno. xiv:3. In the first place, Jesus frequently 
mentions his own death, and distinctly speaks of 
the death of Peter; and hence if death had been 
the thought in his mind. He would liave men- 
tioned it here. In the second place, it was as easy 
for Him to say, " you shall die," as it was to say, 
" I will come again"; and hence the latter, not the 
former, was the subject of His promise. In the 
third place, it was a deception if He said " I will 
com.e again," and meant^ ''you must die." If a 
beloved friend makes us sad by the announcement 
of his departure, and then cheers our sorrowful 
hearts with the promise, " I Avill come again," 
leaving us to discover after his departure that he 
took that method of informing us that Ave must 
die, we could not think well of his candor. In the 
fourth place, Jesus does not come again at our 
death, but the uniform mode of the Ncaa^" Testa- 
ment in describing the death of the belicA^er is to 
say A\^e go to be Avitli Him. In the fifth place He 
is spiritually present w^ith His people all the time, 
and hence does not come to them spiritually at 
death. In the sixth place. His coming after the 
resurrection, or on the day of Pentecost, or at the 
destruction of Jerusalem, did not fullill the prom- 
ise, " I Avill receive unto myself." In the seA^enth 
place, He no Avhere else speaks of His coming as 



OUR lord's teaching. 25 



death, but the opposite of death. The Saviour was 
in heaven, not on earth, when Stephen died, and 
the martyr looked up steadfastly with the joyful 
cry, ''Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." Acts viii:59. 
" Willing rather to be absent from the body, and 
to be present with the Lord," by going to Him, 
not by His coming to us. 2 Cor. v:8. "Having 
a desire to depart, and to be wdth Christ," not by 
His coming but by our departure. Peter speaks 
of putting off his tabernacle, and of his " exodus" 
out of the world, but neither he nor any other New 
Testament writer represents death as the coming 
of Christ. It is strange, therefore, that a vast 
majority of Christians, without much thought, it 
is presumed, regard the promise of the Lord, "If 
I go, I will come," as only meaning, now that He 
has gone they must die. If it be said that the 
promise, taken literally, has not been fulfilied to 
the apostles, it is true. Their bodies are still 
waiting in Hope for His Coming. 

Dr. I)avid Brown, who is accepted by the post- 
millenial brethren as the highest authority, quotes 
the promise, and then devotes five pages of his 
book to a very successful attempt at proving that 
it can not refer to death except by way of analogy. 
" It can never be warrantable, and is often danger- 
ous, to make that the primary and proper interjpre 
tation of a passage which is but a secondary, 
though it may be a very legitimate and even irre- 
sistible ajpjylication of it. . . . ' Let not your 
heart be troubled (said Jesus to His sorrowing 
disciples). In my Father's house are many man- 
sions; I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go 
away' — what then? 'Ye shall follow me? Death 



26 



TILL HE COMK. 



shall shortly l)riiio- us together'?' Nay, hut ' if I go 
away / lolll coDie again and receive yoic unto my- 
self; that where I am, there ye may be also.' 
And how know we that, by putting this event ont 
of its scriptural place in the expectations of the 
church, we are not, in a great degree, destroying 
its character and power as a practical principle? 
Can we not believe, though unable to trace it, that 
God's methods are ever the best; and that as in 
nature, so perhaps in revelation, a modiiication by 
us of the divine arrangements, apparently slight, 
and attended even with some seemino; advantao-es, 
may be followed by a total and unexpected change 
of results, the opposite of what is anticipated and 
desired? So we fear it to be here." 

But our Lord Himself leaves no possible room 
for the idle conjecture that in llis frequent pre- 
dictions of His coming lie meant the death of 
Christians. He plaiidy told Peter "by what death 
he should glorify God. And when he had spoken 
this. He saith unto him, follow me. Then Peter, 
turning around, seeth the disciple whom Jesus 
loved following," unbidden, but followino; because 
he loved to be with Jesus. " Peter, seeing him, 
saith to Jesus, Lord, and what shall this man do? 
Jesus saith unto him, if I will that he tarry till I 
come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me. 
Then went this saying abroad among the brethren, 
that that disciple should not die: yet Jesus said not 
unto him, he shall not die ; but, if I will that he tarry 
till I come, what is that to thee?" John xxi:19-23e 

From this it is as plain as the shining of the sun 
that the disciples did not understand the coming 
of Christ and death to mean one and the same 



OUR LORD S TEACHING. 



27 



thing-. Tliey understood tlieni to mean ju^^t tlu' 
opposite of each other, believing that the coming 
of Christ would prevent the death of John, a con- 
viction '' into Avhicli they more easily fell," as Dr. 
David Brown informs us, ^'froni the prevalent 
belief that Christ's second coming was then near at 
hand." Owing to this saying of our Lord a rumor 
prevailed for a long time in the church that John 
had not died, and could not die; and Theophylact 
speaks of a tradition that he is kept alive some- 
where, to be slain with Elias by the Antichrist. It 
is certain, therefore, that the early Christians did 
not regard the promise, " I will come again," as 
fulfilled in their death. It was not death, hateful 
and hideous death, lie set before them as their 
hope, nor Avas it the destruction of Jerusalem, 
which Gerhard truly says "is never in one instance 
in Scripture called the coming of Christ," nor is it 
even the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit, sweet 
and comfortable as it is to know that He dwells 
with us and in us forever; but it was the return of 
the Lord Himself. Although death is a common 
theme of thought and discourse among Christians 
now, it is seldom mentioned in the Kew Testa- 
ment, and in the passages that contain allusions to 
it, generally the word sleep is employed. " The 
grave is not the goal " placed before the believer, 
nor the repose of the disembodied state, nor happy 
experiences alon^ the way, l)ut the Saviour's ad- 
vent to take body and soul home. " Never do we 
please Christ so much," says Dr. David Brown, 
" as when we ' refuse to be comforted,' even with 
His own consolations, sa\-e in the prospect of His 
Personal Heturny Tiie italics are his own. 



28 TIM- UK COME. 



Let not my eyos with tears be dim, 
Let joy their upward glance illume; 
Look up, and watch, and w^ait for Him- 
8oon, soon the Lord will come. 

Soon w^ill that star-paved milky way, 
Soon will that beauteous azure dome, 
Glories, ne'er yet conceived, display — 
Soon, soon the Lord will come. 

Changed in the twinkling ot an eye, 
Invested with immortal bloom, 
I shall behold Him throned on high, 
And sing. -The Lord is come!' 

One beam from His all-glorious face 
These mortal garments will consume, 
Each sinful blemish will efface— 
Lord Jesus, quickly come! 

What will it be with Thee to dwell, 
Thyself my everlasting Home! 
Oh. bliss — Oh, joy ineffable! 
Lord Jesus, quickly cornel" 



HIS COMINCr MAY IJE NP:AR. 29 

CHAPTER III. , 

HIS COMING MAY BE NEAR. 

ALL who read the New Testament carefully 
must perceive that our Lord, and then the 
Holy Ghost by the apostles, represent His second 
advent as possible at any time. " Watch, there- 
fore; for ye know not what hour your Lord doth 
come. But know this, that if the goodman of the 
house had known in what watch the thief would 
come, he would have watched, and would not have 
suffered his house to be broken up. Therefore be 
ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not, 
the Son of man cometh." Matt xxiv:42-tt4. This 
sounds like IHs admonition to the unfaithful 
Church of Sardis: "I know thy works, that thou 
hast a name, that thou livest, and art dead. Be 
watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, 
tliat are ready to die: for I have not found thy 
works perfect before God. liemember therefore 
liow thou hast received and heard; and hold fast, 
and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I 
will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not 
know what hour I will come upon thee " Kev. 
ii;:l-3. 

''Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know 
not when the time is. For the JSon of man is as a 
man taking a far journey, who left his house, and 
gave authority to his servants, and to every man 
his work, and commanded the porter to watch. 



30 TILL HE COME. 



Watch ye, therefore; for ye know not when the 
master of the honse cometh, at even, or at mid- 
night, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning; 
lest coming suddenly, he find yon sleeping. And 
what I say unto you, I say unto all, Watch." 
Mark, xiii:33-37. Here the word for vmtch in the 
first verse means " to lie awake, to be sleepless," 
and in the three other places it means to '^ awaken, 
wake up, rouse, stir," as if the Lord would say, at 
even " lie awake," at midnight, at the cockcrow- 
ing, in the morning, " wake up." He seems to 
anticipate the discoveries of modern science, for if 
He should descend at this moment from heaven, 
and call His scattered saints to meet IHm in the 
air, to some it would be at even, to others at mid- 
night, to others at the cockcrowing, and to otliers 
when the morning had further advanced. But it 
is obvious that He wishes us to be on the look-out 
for Him every hour. 

'^ Let your loins be girded about, and your lights 
burning : and ye yourselves like unto men that Avait 
for their Lord, when He will return from the 
wedding; tliat, when he cometh and knocketh, they 
may open unto Him immediately. Blessed ai-e 
tliose servants, whom the Lord, when He cometh, 
shall find Avatching: verily, I say unto you, tliat 
He shall gird Himself, and make them to sit down 
to meat, and will come forth aiul serve them. And if 
He shall come in the second Avatch, or come in the 
third Avatcli, and find them so, blessed are those 
servants. . . . Be ye therefore ready also: for 
the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think 
not." This is folloAved by a A'ery solemn Avarning 
against the present common habit of saying that 



HIS COMING MAY BE NEAK. 31 

he cannot come for a thousand years, or, as some 
assert, for one hundred thousand years. " If that 
servant say in his heart, My Lord delayeth Plis 
coming; and shall begin to heat tlie men servants 
and maidens, and to eat and drink, and be drunk- 
en; the Lord of that servant will come in a day 
when he looketh not for Him, and at an hour when 
he is not aware, and will cut him in sunder, and 
will appoint him his portion with the unbelievers." 
Luk., xii -.35-46. 

The epistles also are full of the thought that the 
coming of Christ may be at hand. " Even we our- 
selves groan witliin ourselves, waiting for the adop- 
tion, the redemption of our body," and the redemp- 
tion, we know, can occur only at the second advent. 
Horn. viii:23. "Waiting for the coming of our 
Lord Jesus Christ." I'Cor. i:7. "Let your 
gentleness be known unto all men. The Lord is 
at hand." Phil. iv:5. "Ye turned to God from 
idols, to serve the living and true God; and to wait 
for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from 
the dead, Jesus, who delivered us from the wratli 
to come." IThess. i:9, 10. "The Lord Himself 
shall descend from heaven with a shout; . 
and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we 
which are alive and remain, shall be caught up to- 
gether witli them in clouds, to meet the Lord in 
the air.'' 1 Thess. iv:16, 17. It is evident that 
the apostle lioped to be alive at the descent of the 
Lord Himself from heaven to summon His waiting 
ones to meet liim in the air. 

We are not surprised, therefore, to find him 
describing the proper attitude of tlie l)eliever as 
" looking for that blessed hope and appearing of 



32 



TILL HE COME. 



the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus 
Christ." Tit., ii:13. " Unto them that look for 
Him shall He appear the second time without sin 
unto salvation." Heb. ix:28. "For yet a little 
while, and He that shall come will come, and will 
not tarry." Heb. x:37. "Be ye also patient; 
stablish your liearts: for the coming of the Lord 
draweth nicrh," Jas., v:8. "The end all thino-s 
is at hand: be ye therefore sober, and watch unto 
prayer," 1 Pet. iv:7; upon which Calvin remarks, 
'^ The end he speaks of is not merely that of each 
several individual, but the entire renovation of the 
world; as if he said, that Christ will shortly come, 
and put an end to all things. . . . I)id the 
trump of Christ sound in our ears, it would keenly 
smite all our senses, nor suffer them to lie thus 
torpid. It might be objected, however, that a long 
series of ages lias elapsed since Peter wrote this, 
and still the end is not yet seen. I answer, that 
to us time seems long for this reason, that we 
measure its length by the spaces of the present life, 
but that, could we have respect to the perpetuity 
of the life to come, many generations would be for 
us as it were a moment (2 Pet. iii:8). Moreover^ 
it )iiust he held as a first jprincijple^ that^ ever since 
the appearance of Christy there is nothing left to 
the faithful, hut with yyil'eful minds to he a'hoays 
intent on His second advent ^ 

" Little chiklren, it is til e hist time; and as ye 
have heard that Antichrist shall come, even now 
are there many Antichrists; whereby we know that 
it is the last' time." 1 J no. ii:18. ^^ IMiold, I 
come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast, that 
no man take thy crown." Rev. iii:ll. ^'Behold, 



HIS COMTXO MAY V,K NKAIJ 



I come as a tliief. Blessed is lie that watclieth, 
and keepetli his garments, lest he ^^'alk naked, and 
they see his shame." Rev. xvi:15. '^ ]]ehold, I 
come qnickly: blessed is he that keepeth the say- 
ings of the prophecy of this book." Kev. xxii:7. 
"Behold, I come qnickly; and my reward is with 
me, to give every man according as his work shall 
be." Kev. xxii:12. "Snrely I come qnickly; 
amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesns." Bev. xxii:20. 

From this it is plain to the nnprejndiced reader 
of the Bible, that Christ, and after Him the Holy 
Spirit, songht to make the impression that the 
second advent might occnr during the generation 
which immediately followed the death and resnr- 
rection of the Savionr. It is needless to say that 
no deception was intended or practiced, for apart 
from the fact that sncli a tlionght wonld be blas- 
phemy, we mnst remember that Jesns Himself 
tells ns, " Of that day and honr knoweth no man, 
no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the 
Son, but the Father" Mark, xiii:32. As Dr. 
Joseph Addison Alexander trnly remarks, "That 
sncli a declaration shonld l)e made at all, is wonder- 
ful enough, l)nt scarcely credible on any supposi- 
tion, or in any sense, if made in reference to the 
date of the destruction of Jerusalem." 

To this it may be added that such a declaration 
could not be made in any other than the gospel 
according to Mark, wdiere the purpose of the Spirit 
is to descril)e the Son of God as tlie obedient serv- 
ant; and "the servant knoweth not what his Lord 
doeth." Jno. xv:13. It is not a denial of our 
Lord's divine ominiscience, but simply an assertion 
that in the economy of human redemption it was 



b4 TILL HE COME. 



not for Him "to know the times or the seasons, 
which the Father hath appointed by His own au- 
thority." Acts i:7. Jesus knew that He will come 
again, and often spoke of His second advent, but it 
did not fail to His office as Son to determine the 
date of His return, and hence He could hold it up 
before His followers as the object of constant ex- 
pectation and desire. 

In the second place we are not competent to 
understand what is meant by "quickly" from the 
heavenly standpoint of view. There is "no night 
there," Rev. xxii:5; no revolution of the earth upon 
its axis, no dragging of wearisome hours, but ever- 
lasting bliss and glory in the presence of Him 
with whom " a thousand years as one day " pass in 
perfect peace. 2 Pet. iii:8. Hence as time is counted 
in the bright skies, two days have not yet gone by 
since Jesus ascended from the mount of Olives. 

In tlie third place, the church is presented in the 
New Testament, not as detached particles of sand, 
but as a unit, " and every one members one of an- 
other." Rom. xii:b. When it is a question of 
life she is called the body of Christ, when it is a 
question of love she is the bride of Christ. Con- 
sidered as an organism or person, the measure of 
tlie nearness which the second advent has to one 
meml)er is the measure of its nearness to all the 
meml)ers, and the first believers are no less con- 
cerned than the last in tlie blessedness of His per- 
sonal return. The body will not be complete, nor 
will the bride be perfectly builded from the 
wounded side of the second Adam, nor will the 
deep slumber of the grave be broken, until He 
comes agaiJi 



HIS COMING MAY BE NEAR. 35 

In the fourth place, the Redeemer's second ap- 
pearing is " z^A^^ hope set before iis," Ileb. vi:18; 
in the language of Dr. David Brown, ''THE 
YERY POLE-STAR OF THE CHURCH." 
The object of hope to one is the object of hope to 
all, or the unity of the church is destroyed, and it 
could no longer be true that " there is one body, 
and one spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of 
your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one 
God and Father of alb" Eph. iv:4-6. Hence it 
was unavoidable, from this unity, that the early 
Christians also should be incited to fidelity by a 
hope that is common to tlie entire church. 

In the fifth place, if our Lord referred to His 
second coming at all, it may be said reverently that 
He could not have spoken of it otherwise than He 
did without defeating the end for which He pro- 
claimed it to the apostles. Archbishop Trench 
has well remarked, "It is not that He desires each 
succeeding generation to believe that He will cer- 
tainly return in their time, for He does not desire 
our faith and our practice to be founded on an 
error, as, in that case, the faith and practice of all 
generations except the last would be. But it is a 
necessary element of the doctrine concerning the 
second coming of Christy that it should he jpossible 
at any time^ that no generation should consider it 
improhahle in theirsP Rev. John Ker, D. D., 
also says, "It is in the New Testament the great 
event that towers above every other. The heaven 
that gives back Christ gives back all that we 
have loved and lost, solves all doul)ts, and ends all 
■^oiTOws. His coming hjoks in u])on tlie wliole 
life of the church, as a lofty mountain peak looks 



86 TILL HE COME. 



in upon every little valley and sequestered house 
around its base, and belongs to them all alike. 
Every generation lies under the shadow of it." 

It is not strange, therefore, to find Jesus Christ 
and the Spirit teaching the early disciples to look 
for the second advent of our Lord, nor is it strange 
to find the apostles in their inspired writings ex- 
pressing the hope that He might return in their 
day. The fact is that there is no predicted event 
between this passing moment and the coming of 
the Lord for His saints, although prophecies re- 
main to be fulfilled between the present hour and 
the appearing of the Lord with His saints. The 
first Christians were precisely right, as we are, in 
maintaining an attitude of constant looking for 
Him, without having their minds diverted by cur- 
rent events. On the first day of the week they 
met to ''show the Lord's death till He come." 1 
Cor. xi:26. It was not revealed to them when He 
will come back, but it was revealed that He desired 
them to be in a posture of constant waiting and 
watching for Himself. Wlietlier Ave can under- 
stand the reasonableness of His will or not, it is 
wise to heed His commancL "Behold, to obey is 
better than to sacrifice, and to hearken, tlmn the 
fat of rams." 1 Sam. xv:22. An order of godly 
monks, known as Sleepless Ones, was founded on 
the Bosphorus A. D. 430. They numbered 300, 
and were divided into six choirs, so that day and 
night tlieir liymns ascended to our risen Lord. 
They sang and watched continually for the coming 
of the Bridegroom. But at last silence and sleep 
succeeded souo^ and vi^i lance, and spiritual life was 
dwarfed in Europe for a thousand years. 



HIS COMING MAY BE NEAR. 37 



' How long, Oh Lord our Saviour, 
Wilt thou remain away? 
Some hearts are growing weary, 
For Thy so long delay. 
Oh, when shall come the moment, 
When, brighter far than morn, 
The sunlight of thy glory 
Shall on Thy people dawn? 

How long. Oh heavenly BridegrooiD 

How long dost thou delay? 

And yet, how few are grieving, 

That Thou dost absent'stay! 

Thy very bride her portion 

And calling hath forgot. 

And seeks for ease and pleasure, 

AVhere Thou, her Lord, art not. 

Awake Thy slumbering virgins. 
Send forth the solemn cry. 
Let all Thy saints repeat it — 
The Bridegroom draweth nigh. 
Let all our lamps be burning. 
Our loins well-girded be. 
Each eager heart expecting 
With joy Thy face to see." 



38 TILL HE (^OME. 



CHAPTER lY. 

THE PEESENT AGE. 

THE word for age is usually and improperly 
translated world in our authorized version. 
The following are examples " The harvest is the 
end of the age," Matt. xiii:39; " Lo, I am with 
you alway, even unto the end of the age," Matt. 
xxviii:20; "Be not conformed to this age," Rom. 
xii:2: "The srod of this asre hath blinded the 



g^ 



minds of them which believe not," 2 Cor. iv:4; 
Christ " gave Himself for our sins, that He might 
deliver us from this present evil age," Gal. i:4. 
God " set Him at His own right hand in the 
heavenlies, far above all principality, and power, 
and might, and dominion, and every name that is 
named, not only in this age, but also in that which 
is to come." Eph. i:20, 21; "The rulers of the 
darkness of this age," Eph. vi:12; "Having loved 
this present age," 2 Tim. iv:10; "The powers of 
the age to come," Heb vi:5. 

Bagster's Analytical Lexicon gives as the defini- 
tion of the word, " a period of time of significant 
character; life, an era; an age; hence, a state of 
things marking an age or era; the present order of 
nature; the natural condition of man, the world." 
It stands, of course, in contrast with the age to 
co:;ie, and in the New Testament the present 
period of time has a significant character of evil, 
of self denial, sorrow, suffering, trial for the people 



THE PRESENT A(;E. 81) 



of God, until that age^ to come shall burst upon 
their gladdened view. There is not even a hint 
from the tirst of Matthew to the last of Revelation 
that this significant character will be changed dur- 
ing the entire age in which we live, or until the 
second advent of Christ. 

Jesus tells us that the tares and the wheat 
"grow^ together until the harvest," and as already 
seen, " the harvest is the end of the age." Matt. 
xiii:30, 39. " He said to them all. If any man 
will come after me, let him deny himself, and take 
up his cross daily, and follow me." Lu. ix:23. 
" If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me 
before it hated you. If ye were of the world, the 
world would love his own; but because ye are not 
of the world, but I have chosen you out of the 
world, therefore the world hateth you. Kemember 
the word that I said unto you. The servant is not 
greater than his Lord. If they have persecuted 
me, they will also persecute you ; if they have kept 
my saying, they will keep your's also." Jno. xv: 
18-20. '' In the world ye shall have tribulation." 
Jno. xvi:33. "The world hath hated them, be- 
cause they are not of the world, even as I am not 
of the world." Jno. xvii:14. Where is there an 
intimation in the teachings of our Lord that this 
state of things will be changed, and that His fol- 
lowers will become so numerous and victorious, 
they shall no longer bear the cross, nor feel the 
hard pressure of adverse circumstances? 

But do the apostles cheer us with the hope of a 
better time during the present age? Nay, they 
remind us " that we must throuorh much tribula- 
tion enter into the kingdom of God," Acts xiv:22; 



40 TILL HE f'OME. 



that we are "heirs of God, and joint-heirs with 
Christ; if so be that we snffer with Him, that we 
may be also glorihed together," Rom. viii:17; that 
" unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not 
only to believe on Him, but also to suffer for His 
sake," Phil. i:29; that "if we suffer, we shall also 
reign with Him," 2 Tim. ii:12; "Yea, and all that 
will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer perse- 
cution; but evil men and seducers shall wax worse 
and worse, deceiving, and being deceived," 2 Tim. 
iii:12, 13; "and the whole world lietli in the 
wicked one," 1 Jno. v:19. Can a line be pointed 
out in any of the epistles which gives promise of a 
day when the saints must no more through much 
tribulation enter into the kingdom of God, when 
the godly are no mare to suffer persecution, when 
the world is no more to lie in the wicked one? It 
may be said that the church does not suffer perse- 
cution now — but why? Alas! because the church 
has been converted to the world, and the world 
does not persecute its own. But let the church be 
separate from the world, according to our Lord's 
command and prayer, and it would soon be seen 
that the offence of the cross has not ceased. - 

Even if it be true that the church will extend 
her influence, and establish institutions of learn- 
ing, and uplift the race to a loftier plane of liberty 
aiul intelligence and morality by the power of 
Christian civilization, what sort of a millenium 
would it be? * Out of the present population of the 
earth a babe is born into the world every second, 
nine hundred and ninety-nine times in a thousand 
amid the fi'itrhtful a":onies of the mothers; and at 
evei-y swing of the pendulum a human being dies, 



THE l*RKSp]Nr AUK 



41 



nine linndred and ninety-nine times in a tlionsand 
amid pain and snffering nnntterable. It is esti- 
mated that 8(3,400 babes, little children, youth, 
persons in the midst of their brief existence, and 
in old age, liave tlie life choked out of them every 
day by the ruffian hand of violence, or by some hor- 
rible malady, 32,000,000 being tortured and slaught- 
ered every year; and no increase of the church can 
avert the (h'eadful ravages of physical disorder and 
mental distress. Nay, since the time'Jesus was nailed 
to the cross, millions of His followers have been 
called to face death in its most horrible form, and 
to-day tens of thousands of the most saintly women 
are quiveriug in the ruffian grasp of disease, or 
weeping in desolated homes over the burial of all 
earthly Joy. 

Even those who argue most earnestly, that Christ 
took our sicknesses in the same sense in which He 
took our sins, and who assert most confidently that 
sickness may be healed in answer to faith, sicken 
and die like the rest, and find out that during the 
present age "it is appointed unto men once to 
die." Heb. ix:28. It would be amusing, if it were 
not so sad, to see blear-eyed, cadaverous, lop-sided 
men and women running around the country, 
and talking of the blessedness of being kept by 
Faith in perfect soundness of body. They too 
become bald, and gray headed, and wrinkled, and 
infirm, and lose their teeth, and have headaches 
and heartaches, and go on tottering feet to the 
grave, and breathe the prayer of Moses, the man of 
God, "Our years we pass off like a sigh. Three- 
score and ten are the years of our life, or, if our 
strength endure, they may be fourscore years; yet 



42 TILL HE COME. 

at their best they are toil and emptiness; for they 
pass swiftly, and we fly away." Ps. xc:10. 

More than eighteen hundred years ago the Holy 
Ghost testified, "the whole creation groaneth and 
travaileth together in pain until now." Rom. 
viii:22, and it is so still. According to the report 
of the Signal Service Department of the Govern- 
ment, during the eighteen years preceding 1891, 
there were 2,000 cyclones or tornadoes in the 
United States, killing 1,826 men, women and chil- 
dren, and destroying property to the amount of 
$34,894,700, and it is admitted tliat many similar 
storms were not reported. The air is heavy 
with the germs of pestilence. Each continent, 
nay, each state, is an Aceldema, a field of 
blood, covered with human bodies slain in battle. 
Crime and cruelty and vice that might shame the 
wild beasts, blacken all pages of the world's history. 
The sea roars in rebellion and wrath ao-ainst tlie 
wickedness of man. The earth trembles and quakes 
at his audacity. The soil yields a reluctant return 
to his unceasincT toil The lower animals wao-e 
ferocious war with one another; and look where we 
may, we behold confusion, disorder and unrest, 
every note of nature sounding forth in the * minor 
key, as the musicians tell us, its sad complaint. 

" Six thousand years of sorrow have welhiigh 
Fultilled their tardy and disastrous course 
Over a sinful world; and what remains 
Of this tempestuous state of human things 
Is merely as the working of the sea 
Before a calm that rocks itself to rest. 

The world appears 

To toll the death-bell of its own decease, 
And by the voice of all its elements 
To preach the general doom!" 



THE i'KKsi;.\'i' A(;i': 



|:^ 



Contrast this Avitli the time when ''they shall 
beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears 
into priming-hooks; nation shall not lift np sword 
against nation, neither shall they learn war any 
more." Isa. ii:4; when the wolf also shall dwell 
with the laml), and the leopard shall lie down Avith 
the kid ; and the calf and the young lion, and the 
fatlinor tOD-ether; and a little child shall lead them." 
Isa. xi:6; when "the inhabitant shall not say, I 
am sick," Isa. xxxiii:24; when ''the desert shall re- 
joice and blossom as the rose," Isa. xxxv:l; when 
God shall say, "as the days of a tree are the days 
of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the 
work of their hands; they shall not labor in vain, 
nor bring forth for trouble." Isa. lxv:22, 23. It 
is obvious that the present age is under " the age 
rulers of this darkness." Eph. vi:12. 

But may not the glowing predictions, just 

quoted, be fulfilled in the gradual enlargement 

and extension of the church? Impossible, because 

of the reply our Lord gave to the inquiry of His 

apostles, " what shall be the sign of thy coming, 

and of the end of the age?" Matt. xxiv:3. He 

ishows that the entire interval, up to the time of 

His comincr, will be filled with wars, and rumors 

^. . . . . 

of wars, nation rising against nation, and kingdom 

against kingdom; "and there shall be famines, 
and pestilences, and earthquakes in divers places. 
All these are the beginning of travailing pangs," 
which grow more and more severe, until immedi- 
ately after an unparalelled tribulation, " such as 
was not since the beginning of the world," they 
shall see the Son of Man comincr in the clouds of 
heaven, with power and great glory. Matt. xxiv:4-30. 



44 TILL HE ( OME. 



Impossible again, because the Holy Ghost, in 
correcting the error of the Thessalonians who 
feared that the day of the Lord had already come, 
distinctly says " It will not be, except the falling 
aAvay come first, and the man of sin be revealed, 
the son of perdition, he that opposeth and exalteth 
himself against all that is called God or that is 
worshipped; so that he sittethinthe temple of God, 
setting himself forth as God. Eemember ye not 
that when I was yet with yon, I told you these 
things? And now ye know that which restraineth, 
to the end that he may l)e revealed in his own 
season? For the mystery of lawlessness doth 
already work; only there is one that restraineth 
now, until he be taken out of the way. And then 
shall be revealed the lawless one, whom the Lord 
Jesus shall slay with the breath of his mouth, and 
bring to naught by the manifestation of His com- 
ing " or presence, as the word is always rendered 
when it refers to a person. 2 Thess. ii:3-8. 

The mystery of lawlessness was working in 
-Paul's day, only there was some power hindering 
or restraining its outward display. But when that 
hindering or restraining power, whatever it may 
be, is taken out of the way, what then? Shall the 
church enter upon its career of peace and purity 
and prosperity, and the gospel lead the nations to 
bow to its beneficent sway? ^ay, there shall be 
revealed the lawless one, who is to be destroyed by 
the appearing, as the word is always rendered 
elsewhere, of our Lord'c personal presence. It is 
evident, therefore, that between the departure and 
return of Christ there is no place for a spiritual mil- 
lennium, or for the universal reign of righteousness. 



THE TRESENT A(;E. 45 

" Thou who from Olive's brow did'st rise 
In glorious triumph to the skies, 
Before the rapt disciples' eyes — 

Lord Jesus, ([uickly come! 
For Thy appearance all things pray, 
All nature sighs at Thy delay, 
Thy people cry, no longer stay. 
Lord Jesus, quickly come! 

Hear Thou the whole creation's groan, 
The burdened creatures' plaintive moan, 
The cry of deserts wild and lone — 

Lord Jesus, quickly come! 
See signals of distress imfurled, 
By states on stormy billows hurled, 
Thou Pole-star of a shipwrecked world. 

Lord Jesus, quickly come! 

Hush the fierce blast of war's alarms. 
The tocsin's toll, the clash of arms. 
Incarnate Love, exert Thy charms. 

Lord Jesus, quickly come! 
Walk once again upon the face 
Of this sad earth's tempestuous seas. 
And still the waves, O Prince of Peace, 

Lord Jesus, quickly come ! 

Lo, Thy fair Bride, with garments torn. 
Of hej ce^lestial radiance shorn, 
Upturns her face with watching w^orn — 

Lord Jesus quickly come! 
Her trickling tears, her piteous cries, 
Her struggles, fears and agonies 
Appeal to Thy deep sympathies — 

Lord Jesus, quickly come ! 

Come, with Thy beauteous diadem. 
Come, with embattled Cherubim, 
Come, with the shout of Seraphim, 

Lord Jesus, quickly come! 
Come, on Thy seat of radiant cloud, 
Come, with the Archangel's trumpet loud, 
Come, Saviour, let the hea^'ens be bowed. 

Lord Jesus, quickly come! " 



46 



TILL HE COME. 



CHAPTER Y. 

THE END OF THE AGE. 

IF righteousness is to prevail during the present 
age, or before the coming of Christ, it is re- 
markable that He said nothing ribout it in the 
long Olivet discourse, containing 97 verses, Matt, 
xxiv, XXV. On the other hand He plainly says, 
" Then shall many stumble, and sliall betray one 
another, and shall hate one another. And many 
false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many. 
And because iniquity shall abound, the love of 
many shall wax cold. But he that shall endure 
unto the end, the same sliall be saved. And this 
gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the 
world for a witness unto all nations; and then 
shall the end come." There is not a line in the 
New Testament which shows that the gospel is to 
be preached for the conversion of all nations; and 
although a large ecclesiastical body recently re- 
ceived with cheers a sneer at the doctrine tliat it is 
to be proclaimed in all the world for a witness 
unto all nations, it was a sneer at the words of oui* 
Lord. 

So far as it is from being true that light breaks 
in amid the stumbling, the betrayal of one another, 
the mutual hatred, tlie rise of false prophets, the 
deception of many, tlie abounding ot iniquity, the 
waxing cold of love, tilings go from bad to worse 
until '' there shall be great tribulation, such as 



THE END OF THE AGE. 47 

was, not since the beginning of the world to this 
time, nor ever shall he." What then? A period 
of great spiritual power and progress and prosper- 
ity? ''IMMEDIATELY after the tribulation of 
those days shall the Son be darkened, and the moon 
shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall 
from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall 
be shaken; and then shall appear the sign of the 
Son of Man in heaven; and then shall all the tribes 
of the earth mourn, and they tliall see the Son of 
Man coming in the clouds of heaven with power 
and great glory. And He shall send His angels 
with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall 
gather together His elect from the four winds, from 
oue end of heaven to the other." The word trans- 
lated immediately is so rendered thirty three times, 
straighhray thirty two times, and forthwith seven 
times. The end of the age shall be reached, there- 
fore, through terrible judgments, not through the 
triumphs of the church. 

'' As the days of JN"oe were, so shall also the 
coming of the Son of Man be. For as in the days 
that were before the flood, they were eating and 
drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until 
the day that Xoe entered into the ark, and knew 
not until the flood came, and took them all away ; 
so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be. 
Then shall two be in the fleld; the one shall be 
taken, and the other left. Two women shall be 
grinding at the mill; the one shall l)e taken, and 
the other left. Watch therefore: for ye know not 
what hour your Lord doth come. Matt. xxiv:37-42. 
The one shall be taken to live forever with the 
Lord, and the other left to judgment. 



48 



TILL HE COME. 



" There shall come a night of such wild affright, 

As none beside shall know; 
When the heaven shall shake, and the wide earth quake 

In its last and deepest woe. 

What horrors shall roll over the godless soul, 

Waked from its death-like sleep; 
Of all hope bereft, and to Judgment left, 

Forever to wail and weep. 

O worldling, give ear, while the saints are near! 

Soon must the tie be riven; 
And men, side by side, God's hand shall divide; 

As far as hell's depths from heaven. 

Some husband, whose head was laid on his bed, 

Throbbing with mad excess, 
Awakes from that dream, b}' the lightning' gleam, 

Alone in his last distress. 

For the patient wife, who through each day's life 

Watched and wept for his soul, 
Is taken awa}^ and no more shall pray — 

For the judgment thunders roll. 

The children of day are summoned away; 

Left are the children of night — 
Sealed is their doom, for there's no more room; 

Filled are the mansions of light." 

'^Then,"^ — emphatic, as Dean Alford says, ''viz, 
the coming of the Lord to His personal reign " — 
" Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened nnto 
ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth 
to meet the bridegroom." Dr. David Brown says, 
" 2'heu — at the time referred to at the close of tlie 
preceding chapter, the time of the Lord's Second 
Coming to reward His faithful servants and to 
take vengeance on the faithless;" and '' so essential 
a featnre of the Christian character, according to 
the New Testament, is looking for Christ's Second 
Appearing, that both real and apparent disciples 
are here described as going forth to meet Him.'' 



THE END OF THE AGE. 49 

No doubt all expositors and Cliristians agree tliat 
the ten virgins represent the professed followers of 
Christ: and hence it is important to notice that 
«^ while the Bridegroom tarried they all nodded 
and slept." It is only when the midnight cry is 
heard, "Behold the Bridegroom cometh," they 
awake. The end, therefore will not find the pro- 
fessing church watching and working. 

On another occasion our Lord said, "As it w^as 
in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days 
of the Son of Man. Tliey did eat, they drank, 
they married wives, they were given in marriage, 
until the day Noe entered into the ark, and the 
flood came, and destroyed them all. Likewise also 
as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they 
drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they 
builded; but the same day that Lot went out of 
Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, 
and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in 
the day when the Son of Man is revealed." There 
is no harm, in itself considered, in that which the 
people at large are represented as doing, nothing 
inconsistent with culture, the advance of art, the 
march of civilization, or the accumulation of 
wealth. But there may be utter ungodliness. 
Look at Berlin, Paris and all the cities of Christen- 
dom. " Nevertheless, when the Son of Man com- 
eth, shall He find faith on the earth?" Of course 
He will find faitli on the earth, when He calls His 
waiting ones to meet Him in the air; but when He 
comes with them, " shall He find faith on the 
earth T' La. xviii:8. 

It is the popular belief, even in the church, that 
the world is moving on to a splendid future, and 



50 TILL HE COME. 



that knowiedge, freedom and social order will mark 
the close of the present age. Bnt Jesns says that 
at the winding np there shall be "npon the earth 
distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and 
the waves roaring; men's hearts failing them for 
fear, and for looking after those things which are 
coming on the earth ; for the powers of heaven 
shall be shaken. And then shall they see the Son 
of Man coming in a clond with power and great 
glory." Hence He adds the admonition, "Take 
heed to yonrselves, lest at any time yonr hearts be 
overcharged with snrfeiting, and drnnkenness, and 
cares of this life, and so that day come npon yon 
unawares. For as ^ snare | like that which catches 
the unwary bird] shall it come on all them that 
dwell [sitting, settled down] on the face of the 
whole earth. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, 
that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all 
these things that shall come to pass, and to stand 
before the Son of Man." Ln. xxi:25-36. What 
He said in the same connection about Jeruselem 
being trodden down of the Gentiles, has been lit- 
erally f uliilled, despite the efforts of Julian the 
Apostate, and of the Crusaders; why should not 
His prediction concerning the condition of the 
world at the second advent be also literally ful- 
filled? It would be an insult to the understanding 
of the reader to suppose that our Lord here refers 
to anything but His personal coming at the end of 
the age. 

It is needless to say that there is nothing in the 
epistles to contradict this plain testimony. " This 
know also, that in the last days perilous [or diffi- 
cult I times sli:dl come. For men shall be lovers 



THE END OF THE AGE. 51 

of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blas- 
phemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unho- 
ly, without natural affection, truce-breakers, false- 
accusers, incontinent, tierce, despisers of those that 
are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of 
pleasure more than lovers of God ; having a form 
of godliness, but denying tlie power thereof," 2 
Tim. iii:l-5. If such will be the condition of 
those wlio profess godliness, what must be the state 
of those who make no profession? Remember 
that this is the Holy Spirit's description of the last 
days. " Knowing this tirst," for it is important 
to know it, " that there sliall come in the last days 
scoffers, walking after tlieir own lusts, and saying, 
where is the promise of His coming? for since the 
fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were 
from the beg-innino; of the creation," 2 Pet. iii:3, 
4. The argument of the scoffers is based upon 
the stability of nature's laws; and it is a suggestive 
fact that in our own day more and more is nature, 
an inanimate and unconscious tiling, pushed to 
the foreground, and more and more is God pushed 
to the background, of man's contemplation,^. "As 
the lio-htninor cometh out of the east, and shineth 
even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the 
Son of Man be," Matt. xxiv:27; and when that 
lightning's flash is seen, causing the solid pillars 
of the globe to shake and tremble, the scoffs of the 
scientists shall suddenly be changed into shrieks 
of terror; but this shall l)e in the last days. 

"Though not quite a millenarian/' wrote Dr. 
James W. Alexander of Xew York, '• I was struck 
with these words of Chalmers to Eickersteth: 
" Without slackino; in the least onr obligation to 



52 TILL HE COME. 



keep forward this great [missionary] cause, I look 
for its conclusive establishment through a widen- 
ing passage of desolating judgments, with the utter 
demolition of our present civil and ecclesiastical 
structures." Just as the Holy Ghost testifies of 
Israel, '' the end thereof shall be with a flood, and 
unto the end of the war desolations are deter- 
mined," or as it is in the margin, "it shall De cut 
off by desolations," Dan. ix:26, even so the same 
Spirit witnesses to the ruin of Christendom. 
"Behold therfore the goodness and severity of 
God ; on them which fell, severity ; but toward thee, 
goodness, if thou continue in His goodness; other- 
wise tliou shalt be cut off." Rom. xi:22. That the 
professing chureli has not continued in the good- 
ness of God, alas ! the most cursory glance will 
show, and hence she is to be set aside as Israel 
was, and disowned for her unfaithfulness. 

"Yet once again Thy sign sliall be upon the heavens 

displayed, 
And earth and it's inhabitants be horribly afraid; 
For not in weakness clad, Thou com'st, our woes, our 

sins, to bear, 
But girt with all Thy Father's might, His vengeance to 

declare. 

The terrors of that awful day. Oh, who can understand? 
Or who abide when Thou in wrath shall lift Thy holy 

hand? 
The earth shall quake, the sea shall roar, the sun in 

heaven grow pale; 
But Thou hast sworn, and wilt not change, Thy faithful 

shall not fail. 

Then grant us. Saviour, so to pass our time in watching 

here, 
That when upon the clouds of heaven Thy glory shall 

appear, 
Uplifting high our joyful heads, in triumph we may rise, 
And enter, with Thine angel train, Tliy palace in the 

skies." 



PARABLES OF MATTHEW XIII. 53 



CIIArTEli YI. 

PARABLES OF MATTHEW XIII. 

OUR post-millennial brethren very properly in- 
sist that these parables were designed to set 
forth the state of things during the present age, 
or up to the time of Christ's second advent. This 
is shown by the fact that they tell us the parable 
of the Mustard seed exhibits the growth of the 
church from a small beginning, " the least of all 
seeds," into its branching glories that will in due 
time afford shade and shelter for all the nations of 
the earth. They also inform us that the parable of 
the Leaven indicates the spread of the gospel or of 
Christianity until the whole world shall be perme- 
ated with the benign iniiuences of religion, as it 
is called. 

But surely they will admit that no interpreta- 
tion of the two parables, which the Saviour did not 
explain, can be correct, if forced to teach a doctrine 
directly opposed to the two that Pie did expound. 
Thus He announces in the parable of the Sower 
that ''the seed is the word of God." One part 
falls upon the hard, beaten pathway skirtino- the 
field, " and the fowls came and devoured them up," 
"the wicked one," Matt. xiii:19, "Satan," Mark 
iv:15, "the devil," Lu. viii:12. Another part falls 
on a thin layer of soil covering a rock, and being 
quickly heated the seed springs up immediately, 
but having no depth of root, it as soon withers. 



54 TILL HE COME. 



Another part falls among thorns, and the thorns 
spring np, and choke the seed. Another part falls 
into good gronnd, but brings forth variously, some 
an hundred fold, some sixty fold, some thirty fold. 
Thus does onr Lord describe the different effects 
of scattering the word of God, and where is the 
intimation that the time is coming when all the 
seed, or the larger portion of it, will iind good 
soil and bring forth an abundant harvest? But if 
the parable of the Mustard Seed and of the Leaven 
denotes the outward and inward expansion of the 
church and Christianity until universal supremacy 
is attained, it is obvious that their meaning is in 
flat contradiction of the testimony given in the 
parable of the Sower. But history for 1,850 years 
confirms the truth of the Lord's statement and 
gives no support to the other view. Only a small 
part of the seed sown has become fruitful. There 
has been no country, no county, no city, no com- 
munity, all of whose inhabitants have received 
Christ as their Saviour; and to-day not a fourth 
even of those who belong to any denomination or 
particular congregation give the slightest evidence 
of possessing real spiritual life. Not a fourth can 
be found to attend regularly the services of 'God's 
house, to be present at the prayer-meeting, to 
teach in the Sunday school, to be separate from 
the world, to speak a word for Christ, really to live 



The second parable our Lord explained is that of 
the Tares and Wheat. " The kingdom of heaven is 
likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his 
field; but while men slept, his enemy came and 
sowed tares among the wheat," the tares being a 



PARABLES OF MATTHEW XTII. 55 

bastard wheat, so like the true that they cannot be 
distinguished from the latter except by their emp- 
tiness. '' He tliat soweth the aood seed is the Son 
of Man; the field is the world; tlie good seed are 
the children oi the kingrdom, but the tares are the 
children of the wicked one; the enemy that sowed 
them is the devil ; the harvest is the end of the age ; 
and the reapers are the angels." Dr. David Brown 
declares that the design of the parable was '' to set 
forth the mixed character of the visible church till 
Christ come. All are agreed in this. But the 
millennium is as truly^ though not in the same 
degree^ a mixed state of the visible church as this 
is. . . The millennium differs in nothing worthy 
of mention in the pai : ble from the present state of 
the church." The italics are his own. 

Bub how does this comport with the theory that 
the leaven is the symbol of the gospel or of Chris- 
tianity, which must work its way " till the whole 
was leavened"? How does it agree with the testi- 
mony of the Holy Ghost, celebrating the reign of 
the coming King, " that in His days shall tlie 
righteous nourish; and abundance of peace so long 
as the moon endureth." Ps. lxxii:7; " they shall not 
hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain; for the 
earth shall be full of the kno^\ ledge of the Lord, as 
the waters cover the sea." Isa. xl:9; "thy people 
also shall be all righteous." Isa. lx:21; "they shall 
teach no more every man his neighbor, and every 
man his brother, saying, know the Lord; for they 
shall all know me, from the least of them unto the 
greatest of them, saith the Lord." Jer. xxxi:34; 
" for from the rising of the sun even unto the 
going down of the same, my name shall be great 



56 TILL HE COME. 



among the Gentiles; and in every place incense 
shall be offered nnto my name, and a pnre offer- 
ing; for my nameshall be great among the heathen, 
saith the Lord of hosts?" Mai. i:ll. How this 
state of things can be made to harmonize with the 
present state of things, does not appear clear to the 
ordinary reader; and if the millenninm differs in 
nothing w^orthy of mention from the present state 
of the church, the Lord have mercy on us, and 
bring the millennium to a speedy end. 

Jesus likens the growth of the church to a 
mustard seed that shoots up and widens out, and 
'^ when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, 
and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air 
come and lodge in the branches thereof." The 
word for hirds is the same that is translated fowls 
in the parable of the sow^er; and inasmuch as He 
explains the meaning of the word in one parable, 
and does not explain it in the other, it is singular 
exegesis which supposes that He means by the 
second use of the word in the same discourse, 
something entirely unlike, and even opposed to, the 
meaning He gives to it in His first use of the word. 
If the fowls or the birds represent the wicked one, 
Satan, the devil, in one place, they represelit the 
same in the other place; and the Saviour teaches 
that " the prince of tlie power of the air" will find 
lodgment m the branches of the great tree. 

As to the parable of the Leaven, it is strange tliat 
our Lord made use of sour dough, or incipient 
putrefaction, as a symbol of the gospel and Chris- 
tianity. It is still stranger that He used as a sym- 
bol of good that which He Himself, and the 
apostles, and all the writers of the Bible, without a 



parablp:s of matthew xttt. 57 

single exception, employ as the symbol of evil. Dr. 
Joseph Addison Alexander says, " the usage is 
indeed so uniform and easily accounted for from 
rational considerations, that nothing can outweigh 
it but tlie equally uniform judgment of interpre- 
ters and readers in all ages that this is an exception 
to the general rule, and that leaven, in this one place 
and its parallel (Luke xiii:21), denotes the spread- 
ing or (liifusi\'e quality of truth and the true relig- 
ion." It is not correct to say that such has been 
the uniform Judgment of interpreters and readers 
in all ages; but even if it were, whether the uniform 
judgment of ignorant interpreters and mistaken 
readers should outweigh the uniform testimony of 
the Holy Ghost, each must decide for himself. 

The leaven represents what it always represents in 
Scripture, that which is evil in doctrine or practice, 
insiduously working its way, until the whole pro- 
fessing mass is leavened, and the Son of God in 
righteous judgment exclaims, '' I will spue thee out 
of my mouth." llev. iii:16. Leaven first appears 
in connection with Sodom, and then in Egypt, and 
it was rigidly excluded from the houses of the 
Israelites during the feast that followed the pass- 
over, two different words being employed to denote 
inherent evil and that which is evil in outward 
life. Ex. xii:15. It was also forbidden in any 
offering to the Lord, that set forth Christ. Lev. i:ll. 
It was allowed in the offerings presented at Pente- 
cost, the admitted type of tlie gathering of the 
Church, because evil was there, as we well know. 
Lev. xxiii:17; Acts v:l-10. Our Lord said to His 
disciples, '' Take heed, and bew^are of the leaven of 
the Pharisees and of the Sadducees," Matt/xvi:6; 



PARABLES OF MATTHEW XITI. 



" and of the leaveii of Herod," Mark viii:15. The 
Pharisees were the ancient legalists; the Sadducees 
were the ancient rationalists; the Herodians were 
the ancient time-servers, determined to keep in 
,with both parties, God and the devil, Christ and 
I the world. Into these three sects nearly the whole 
'of the professing church may now be divided, for 
'the woman has succeeded well in hiding: the leaven 
in the meal. The Holy Ghost, writing to the 
Corintliians about evil practice, says, " Know ye 
not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?" 
1 Cor. v:6. The Holy Ghost, writing to the Gala- 
tians about evil doctrine, says, " A little leaven 
leaveneth the whole lump." Gal. v:9. 

If the objection is raised that Christ would not 
liken the kingdom of heaven to that which is evil, 
it is sufiicioat to reply that He likens the kingdom 
to that which includes both tares and wheat, which 
encloses both good and bad hsh, which extends 
over a wicked servant, Matt. xviii:23-32, which 
admits into it a man who had not on a wedding 
garment, and who was lost, Matt. xxii:l-13. The 
phrase which occurs thirty- two times in the gospel 
of Matthew, and only there, does not mean heaven, 
nor even the church, although there is enough of 
evil in the latter to justify the use of any term that 
would express its rottenness, but it signifies the 
rule of Christ from the heavens over that sphere 
in which He specially manifests His grace. The 
kingdom meanwhile exists in mystery, or conceal- 
ment, or it is not yet made manifest ; and the seven 
parables were spoken to show the state of things, 
during the time of the mysteries of the kingdom, 
or " till He come." 



TILL TIE COME. 59 



Having uttered four of the parables in the 
presence of "great multitudes," He went into a 
house; and when the disciples came to Him, and 
Pie had expounded unto tliem the parable of the 
Tares, which must have been a sore discouragement 
of their faith, and a sad clouding of their hope. He 
cheered their hearts with a brighter view. After 
all the wretched failure of man. He has treasure 
hid in a field, which is the world, and for the sake 
of the treasure He buys the field, so that he will 
yet make good to Israel, now scattered and hid in 
the world. His promise long since forfeited, " Ye 
shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people, 
for all the earth is mine." Ex. xix:5o Nay, there 
is something more precious to Him still, even " one 
pearl of great price. His blood-bought and true 
church, for which He sold all that He had, that He 
might wear it as a jewel on His heart forever. 

Once more, the kingdom of heaven is likened 
unto a drag-net cast into the sea, the entire circle 
of the agencies and means now employed in gather- 
ing men into a profession of Christ's name. But 
a net does not catch all the fish in the sea, and 
even of those caught, some are described as good 
and some as bad. Hence there is to be a judgment 
of those professing Christianity, and a casting 
away of the bad, at the coming of Christ. Until 
that time, however, the two continue together. 
There is positively not a hint in the seven prophetic 
parables of the conversion of the world, but rather 
only partial success, and a mixed state, growing 
worse and worse to tlie end of the age. Is it bet- 
ter to consult our own views as to the future, or 
to submit to the testimony of God's word? 



00 PARABLES OF MATTHEW XIII. 

Saviour, come ! Thy friends are waiting, 
Waiting for the final day; 

Thence the promised glory dating: 
Come and bear Thy saints away. 

Come, Lord Jesus, 
Thus Thy waiting people pray. 

Base the wish, and vain th' endeavour, 
While on earth to find our rest; 

Till we see Thy face, we never 
Shall or can be fully blest. 

In Thy presence 
Nothing shall our peace molest. 

Lord, we Avait for Thine appearing; 

Tarry not, Thy people sa}^; 
Bright the prospect is, and cheering, 

Of beholding Thee that day; 
When our sorrows 

Shall for ever pass away. 

Till it comes, O keep us steady. 
Keep us walking in Thy ways; 

At Thy call may we be ready, 
And our heads with triumph rais^. 

Then with angels 
Sing Thine everlasting praise. 



ANTICHRIST. 61 



CHAPTER YII. 



ANTICHRIST. 



THE Scriptures frequently refer to the appear- 
ing in the last days of a person, or succes- 
sion of persons, or a system, known as the Anti- 
christ. Thus the Spirit writes by the Apostle 
John: " Little children, it is the last time, and as 
ye have heard that tlie Anticlirist shall come, even 
now are there many antichrists; wdiereby we know 
that it is tlie last time." 1 Jiio. ii:18. Again, 
" Every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ 
is come in the flesli is not of God; and this is that 
spirit of tiie Antichrist, whereof ye have heard 
that it sliouhl come ; and even now already is it in 
the world." 1 Jno ix:3. Again, " Many deceivers 
are entered into the workl, even they that confess 
not that Jesus Christ cometh [co7nm(/, present par- 
ticiple] in the Hesh. Tliis is tiie deceiver and the 
Antichrist." 2 Jno. 7, R v. 

The early church, perliaps without an exception, 
believed that tlie predicted antichrist is to be a 
person, the embodiment of human blasphemy and 
wickedness. The learned Greswell says, "The 
fathers are likewise agreed in considering Anti- 
christ liimself to l)e a real person; and no merely 
figurative or syml)olical character. AVhatever he 
may be, and whatever the part which he is destined 
to act, it was the unanimous persuasion of the 
elders of the church that he will be a literal char- 



62 TILL HE COME. 



acter, and his part will be the part of a literal bod- 
ily agent." 

Jerome, for example, writes in his Commentary 
on Dan. vii, " Therefore let ns say, what all the 
ecclesiastical writers have handed down, that, in 
the consummation of the world, when the kingdom 
of the Romans is to be destroyed, there shall be 
ten kino-s who will divide the Roman world between 
them: and that an eleventh will arise, — a little 
king, etc. Let ns not suppose him to be, accord- 
ing to the opinion of some, either Devil or Demon, 
but one of the human race, in whom the whole of 
Satan shall dwell bodily ; . . . for he is ' the Man 
of Sin,' ' the Son of perdition,' so that he dares to 
sit in the Temple of God, jnaking Himself out God." 

Since the Reformation the great majority of 
Protestant expositors regard the prophecy concern- 
ing him as fulfilled in the cliaracter and career of 
the Popes and Popery. The arguments in favor 
of the latter view are ingenious and plausible, but 
if the question is submitted to tlie decision of the 
inspired writings, it will be difficult for an unpre- 
judiced mind, searching after truth, to avoid the 
conclusion that the Cliristians nearest the apostles 
were correct in their opinion. 

In the first place, it is written, " Who is a liar, 
but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He 
is the Antichrist that denieth the Father and the 
Son." 1 Jno. ii:22. Can it be truthfully said of 
Popery, even in its worst days, that it denieth the 
Father and tlie Son? Has it not always maintained 
in its councils, creeds, symbols of faith and wor- 
ship that there are three persons in the Godhead? 
Whatever may have been its departures from the 



ANTICHRIST. 63 



Bible in other respects, in The Canons and Decrees 
of the Council of Trent, it was made obligatory 
upon every Roman Catholic to say, " I believe in 
one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven 
and earth, of whom are all things visible and invis- 
ible; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begot- 
ten Son of God, and born of the Father before all 
ages: God of God, light of light, true God of true 
God; begotten, not made, consubstantial with the 
Father, by whom all things were made ; . . . . and 
in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and the giver of life, 
wdio proceedeth from the Father and the Son." 
The Roman church has never wavered in its adhe- 
rence to this creed, and how can it be said that it 
denies the Father and the Son? 

In the second place, all Protestant coriimentators 
insist that Popery is described under the figure of 
a woman " arrayed in purple and scarlet color, and 
decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, 
having a golden cup in her hand full of abomina- 
tions and tilthiness of her fornications." Rev. xvii: 
4. But this woman, " the mother of harlots," is 
represented as riding upon a l)east which hath 
seven heads and ten horns, universally admitted to 
be the Antichrist. "And the ten horns which 
thou sawest upon the beast, these shall hate the 
whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and 
shall eat her flesh, and burn her with Are." If the 
mother of harlots is Popery, it is impossible that 
the beast, which is conceded to l)e the Antichrist, 
that hates and destroys the whore, should also be 
Popery. 

In the third place, the Holy Ghost by the Apos- 
tle Paul tells us tliat before the day of the Lord 



64 



TILL HE COME. 



sets in, ^' there comes the apostasy first, and that 
man of sin sliall he revealed, the son of perdition; 
who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that 
is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he, as 
God, sitteth in the temple of God, showing him- 
self that he is God." 2 Thess. ii:4. The temple of 
God is an expression applied in the Bible to but 
three things: the temple in Jerusalem, the church 
or the body of the believer. 1 Cor. iii:17; vi:19. 
If the Pope or Popery is meant by the man of sin, 
the son of perdition, the Antichrist, then the Pope 
must be sitting in the church of God, and Popery 
must be the Christian church, a conclusion against 
which tliose who liold this view would be the first 
to protest witli vehement earnestness. Besides, it 
is not true that the Pope has exalted himself 
above all that is called God, or that is worshipped. 
However false and impious his claims, he sends 
forth his decrees and proclamations as the vicege- 
rent of God, as the vicar of Christ, always recog- 
nizing his subordination to a power higher than 
his own. (3f tlie Lawless one, or Antichrist, it is 
said, "whose coming |wliose ^^^/v^?^^/^!^, the same 
word tliat is used to describe our Lord's personal 
return] is after the working of Satan, with all 
power, and signs, and lying wonders, and with all 
deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that 
perish; because they received not the love of the 
truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause 
God sliall send them a strong delusion, that tliey 
should believe a lie: that they all might be damned 
who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in 
unrighteousne.^..," 2 Thess. ii:9-12. All that is in 
Popery or Protestanism, which accepts not the 



AN'riClIKTST. 05 



truth, or the word of God, leads on to the Anti- 
christ; but we should distinguish between the cause 
and the effect, and expect at the end a personal 
embodiment of Satan, with Satan's power to work 
miracles. It will be observed that the man of sin, 
the son of perdition, exalts hlniself above all that 
is called God, or that is worshipped, and surely 
this cannot be said of a system or of a succession 
of persons. Nor is he a worshipper, as Popes and 
Popery are, but worshipped, reminding us of the 
words addressed to him by the Holy Ghost of old: 
'' llow art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer 
[Daystar, a title stolen from Christ], son of the 
mornincr! For tliou hast said in thine heart, I will 
ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne al)Ove 
the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount 
of the congregation, in the sides of the north [Ps. 
xlviii:2] : I will ascend above the heights of the 
clouds: I will be like the Most High," Isa. xiv:12- 
14. Bishop Horsley has well described him as 
"that son of perdition, who shall be neither a 
Protestant nor a Papist, neither Christian, nor 
Jew, nor Heathen; who shall worship neither God, 
Angel, nor Saint; who will neither supplicate the 
invisil)le majesty of Heaven, nor fall down before 
an idol. He will magnify HIMSELF against 
everything that is called God, or is worshipped : 
and with a bold flight of impiety, soaring far 
above his precursors and typ-:s in the time of Pagan- 
ism — the Sennacheribs, the Nebuchadnezzars, the 
Antiochuses, and the Heathen Emperors, will 
claim divine honors to himself exclusively, and 
consecrate an imaoe of Jiimself." 

In tlie fourth j)hxce, " x\ll tlie world wondered 



66 TILL HE COME. 



after the beast [the Antichrist], and they worshipped 
the dragon [the devil], which gave power unto a 
beast." The Pope and Popery may worship the 
Virgin and saints, but it is not true that they wor- 
ship the devil, as men are openly beginning to do 
in France, and Italy, and other atheistic communi- 
ties. '' All that dwell upon the earth shall worship 
him, whose names are not written in the book of 
life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the 
world." Rev. xiii:4-8. That is to say, if the Pope 
or Popery is the Antichrist, the hosts of Antichrist 
are found wholly among those who Avorship the 
Pope; and the unavoidable result stares us in the 
face that all who do not worship him have their 
names in the Lamb's book of life, including such 
names as Yoltaire, Thomas Paine, John Stuart 
Mill, Darwin, Huxley, Herbert Spencer, John 
Morley, Bradlaugh, IngersoU and other arrogant 
blasphemers. To such absurdities are men led 
when tlieir minds are pre-occupied with a theory 
which they are determined to maintain. 

In the fifth place, " If any man worship the beast 
and his image, and receive his mark in his fore- 
head, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the 
wine of the wratli of God, wliich is poured out 
without measure into the cup of His indignation; 
and he sliall be tormented with hre and brimstone 
in the presence of the holy angels, and in the 
presence of the Land); aiul the smoke of their tor- 
ment ascendeth up forever and ever; and they have 
no rest day nor night, vrho worsliip the beast and 
his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of 
his name." Rev. xiv:9-ll. Hence if tlie Pope or 
Popery is the Antichrist, not only all who worship 



ANTICHRIST. 67 



the Roman Catholic Church, but all who in any- 
wise recognize its authority, are doomed to a fright- 
ful and everlasting punishment, although it will 
scarcely be denied that there have been, and are 
still, numbers of really godly men and women in 
that communion, notmthstanding the monstrous 
errors of the system. 

In the sixth place, those who see nothing but 
the Pope or Popery in the Antichrist are com- 
pelled to put loose and fanciful interpretations 
upon the Scriptures, thus creating and fostering 
the wi-etched habit of reading the word of God as 
if it does not mean what it says. In the plainest 
and most explicit manner it is repeatedly stated 
that the duration of the Antichrist's dreadful power 
is limited to " 1260 days," or '' forty and two 
months," or '' a time, times, and the dividing of 
time," commencing his persecutions in the midst 
of the last heptad, Dan. ix:27, and continuing 
them for three and one-half years. But in order 
to make them fit the Poman Catholic Church these 
days, so carefully defined and guarded, are stretched 
out into years, whose beginning and end are sub- 
jects of the wildest conjecture. 

In the seventh place, the Antichrist shall sud- 
denly be destroyed " in the latter days." A stone 
not in hands falls upon the ten confederated king- 
doms of which he is the head, and grinds them to 
powder, and makes tliem as the chaff of the sum- 
mer threshing floors. Dan. ii:28-45. "He shall 
plant the tabernacles of his palace between the 
seas [the Dead Sea and the Mediterranean] in the 
glorious holy mountain [Mount Zion]; yet he shall 
come to his end, and none shall help him." Dan. 



68 TILL HE COME. 



xi:45. Immediately after the tribulation, which 
occurs under his reign, Christ appears for his over- 
throw. Matt. xxiv:29-31, " Then shall be revealed 
the Lawless one, whom the Lord Jesns shall con- 
sume with the breath of his mouth, and destroy 
by the epiphany of his presence." 2 Thess. ii:8. 
At the descent of Christ from heaven, the Anti- 
christ and his false prophet are " cast alive into a 
lake of fire burning with brimstone." Rev. xix:20. 
All of this is utterly inconsistent with the idea of 
a gradual extinction, or even a violent ending, of 
a system or succession of persons. 

Indeed the personality of the Antichrist is so 
distinctly and variously marked that no other 
thought could have ever been entertained, if it had 
not been for the dream that we are to lind him in 
the Pope or Popery. Iren?eus, A. D. 180; Tertul- 
lian, A. D. 200; Hippolytus, A. D. 220; Origen, 
A. D. 225; Lactantius, A. D. 300; Athanasius, 
A. D. 340; Hilary, A. D. 350; Cyril of Jerusa- 
lem, A. D. 360; Ambrose, K. D." 370; Jerome, 
A. D. 390; Chrysostom, A. D. 400, and many 
others of the so-called Fathers speak of him as a 
person, an incarnate devil, sitting in the rebuilt 
temple at Jerusalem when the Lord shall appear. 
In "The Teaching of the Apostles," a most valu- 
able manuscript, reaching back to A. D. 80 or 90, 
it is said, "wlien lawlessness increases, they shall 
hate and persecute and deliver up one another; 
and then shall appear the World-deceiver as Son 
of God, and shall do signs and wonders, and the 
earth shall be delivered into liis hands, and lie 
sliall do lawless deeds such as liave never yet l>een 
(lone since the beginning of the world." Bad as 



ANTICHRIST. 69 



Popery is, and frightful as its persecution of Grocl's 
saints in the past has been, somethino; worse awaits 
an infidel world. Popery is an Antichrist, and 
much of Protestantism also, for it must he remem- 
bered that if she is " the mother of harlots," she 
has daughters, but she is not the Antichrist. 

Hoppolytus tells us that " the ten states, mean- 
incT tlie ten toes of Daniel's imagre, wdiich will at 
lengtli appear, will be Deinocracies;" and Irenseus 
declares tliat '' the adversary will sit in a temple 
built in Jerusalem, endeavoring; to show himself 
to be Christ." lie is a counterfeit Christ, and 
Greswell endeavors to prove that his title means 
another Christ, a pro Christ, a ^/e^-Christ. But 
the contrasts between the believer's Christ and the 
world's Antichrist are very great and striking. 
The former came down from heaven; the latter 
ascends out of the abyss. Jno. vi:38; Kev. xi:7. 
The former came in His Father's name; the latter 
comes in his own name. Jno. \'A?>. The former 
humbled Himself; the latter exalts himself. Phil. 
ii:8; 2 Thess. ii:4. The former was despised and 
rejected of men; the latter has all the world say- 
ing, "Who is like the beast?" Isa. liii:3; Pev. 
xiii:3-4. The former received a commandment 
from the Father what he should say, and what he 
should speak; the latter will receive his power, and 
his seat, and his great authority from the devil, 
Jno. 12:49; Pev. xiii:4. The former came to do 
His Father's will; the latter comes to do his own 
will, Jno. v:30; Dan. xi:36. The former glorified 
God on tlie earth ; the latter blasphemes the name 
of God. Jno. xvii:4; Pev. xiii:6. The former is 
the good shepherd, Avho giveth his life for the 



70 TILL HE COME. 



slieep; the latter is the idol shepherd, who teareth 
the nock. Jiio. x:14; Zech. xi:16, 17. The former 
was a man of sorrows ; the latter is a king of fierce 
countenance. Isa. liii:8; Dan. viii:23. The former 
came not to destroy men's lives, but to save them; 
the latter shall destroy wonderfully, and shall pros- 
per and practice, and shall destroy the mighty and 
the holy people. Ln. ix:56; Dan. viii:24. The 
former was meek and lowly in heart; the latter 
shall magnify himself in liis heart. Matt. xi:29; 
Dan. viii:25. The former is the Prince of peace; 
the latter is the prince that shall come as a deso- 
lator. Isa. ix:6; Dan. ix:26, 27. The former is 
the Lord from heaven; the latter is the man of 
the earth. 1 Cor. xv:47; Ps. x:18. The former is 
the true vine; the latter is the vine of the earth. 
Jno. v:l; Rev. xiv:18. The former was received 
up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God; 
the latter goeth into perdition. Mark xvi:19; Rev. 
xvii :8, 11. 

These contrasts might be continued at consider- 
able length, but perhaps enough has been said to 
show that the Antichrist is to be a real person. 
He will not appear until tlie ancient Roman em- 
pire reappears in the form of ten independent but 
confederated kingdoms, Dan. vii:21-24:; but the 
Popes and Popery have already existed for centu- 
ries. He is to personify the Godless culture of 
these last days, possessing rare intelligence, indi- 
cated by the fact that the horn of power which 
symbolized him "had eyes and a mouth that 
spake very great things." Dan. vii:20. He is to 
be a scholar of fine attainments, "■ understanding 
dark sentences." Dan. viii:23. He is to exult in 



ANTICHRIST. 71 



the streiiotli of his intellect, for '' lie shall exalt 
himself, and magnify himself above every God, 
and shall speak marvellons things against the God 
of gods." Dan. xi:36. He is to be a warrior of 
renown, for '"• in his office shall he honor the God 
of fortresses." Dan. xi:38; and the Avondering 
Avorld will exclaim, " Who is able to make war 
with him?" Rev. xiii:4. As a man of transcendent 
genius, as a statesman of marvellous ability, as a 
politician of matchless skill, as a soldier born to 
command, it will be easy enough for the ten king- 
doms to elect him their Imperator or Umpire for 
the decision of civil questions, their Generalissimo 
in the event of war, without disturbing their au- 
tonomy. These ten kingdoms, the Scriptures inti- 
mate, will largely manifest the character of a 
democracy, which without the fear of God, tends 
to lawlessness. Well, therefore, is the Antichrist 
called " the Lawless one," for he will give tri- 
umphant expression for a time to the lawlessness 
that already pervades all classes of society, chil- 
dren becoming more and more restless under pa- 
rental authority, servants hating their masters, 
workingmen plotting against their employers, 
subjects rebelling against their rulers, citizens 
seeking the overthrow of their governments, and 
the criminal, and licentious, and infidel classes in- 
creasing with appalling rapidity. 

An eminent statistician has announced in one of 
our lead inor mao-azines that "in 1850 there was 
one criminal in 3,442 of the population of this 
country; in 1860 there was one in 1,647; in 1870 
there was one in 1,172; and in 1880 one in 860." 
That there has been no improvement since 1880 



72 TILT. HE COME. 



may be inferi-ecl from the fact that the leading 
newspaper in one of our large cities recently said, 
" An examination of the jail calendar is appalling, 
and the situation grows worse day by day. Here 
are some figures that cannot even be suspected of 
lying. Tliey were obtained from Deputy Warden 
Soffel. . . For the even year of 1889 there were 
4,198 commitments to jail, or nearly one fifth of 
the total for seven years and six months. For 
eight months and a half of tlie present year [1890], 
there liave been 4,238, forty more than all of last 
year, and Mr. Soffel says tlie condition grows worse 
day by day." Even in sober, staid Philadelphia, 
according to the Record of that city there were 
237 arrests of boys under 15 years of age in the 
month of January, 1891, for burglary, larceny and 
other crimes. 

Meanwhile the Church, not only the Fapal but 
the Protestant, is approaching the Laodicean state, 
which also implies Lawlessness, the word meaning 
" the right, custom, usage, manner or fashion of 
the people." Boastful, proud and insolent, they 
do as they please, and to a lamentable extent vie 
with the world in their contempt of authority, 
human or divine. 

Prominent professors in colleges and even in 
Theological Seminaries stand shoulder to shoulder 
with open infidels in their assaults upon the Avord 
of God. They deny its inspiration, authority and 
authenticity. They sneer at the story of man's fall ; 
they reject miracles; they ridicule prophecy; they 
scout the doctrine of future punishment; and in 
no respect do tliey differ from avowed skeptics 
except in the hollow and hypocritical profession 



ANTK^IIRTST. 73 



of a name. Outside of professing Cliristianity, so 
profound a thinker as John Stuart Mill deliber- 
ately declared that '' the God of the Bible should 
at least never extort fi"oni him the homaoe of love, 
to Avhatever else Jle miglit compel him;'' and so 
influential a member of Parliament as John Mor- 
ley descril)es God as '^ a Beintr no more entitled to 
our homage oi* worship than Francesco (^enci was 
entitled to the filial piety of liis unhappy children;" 
while one of the gi'eatest of EnglandV living poets 
crowns tlie hoi'rible l)laspliemy with the words: 

"Thou art smitten, O (irod, Tlioii nrt smitteu; Thy curse is 

upon Tliee, O Lord! 
And the h)ve song- of earth, as Thou diest, resounds through 

the wind of its wini^s, 
Glory to man in the his2:]iest, for man is the master of things." 

The people have I)een educated to reject with 
scorn the truth that '^ God Avas manifest in the 
Hesh," and the next logical and unavoidable step 
is that '' Man is God." The son of one of the 
most eminent preachers in America, himself a few 
years ago an apparently earnest and intelligent 
Christian, is now lecturing every Sunday in a hall 
to a crowd of renegade Christians, who have 
adopted as their motto, "Down with God; up 
with man;" and this beyond vuestion is the 
popular demand. Inside of professing Christ- 
ianity there are comparatively few who are not 
"traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures 
more than lovers of God ; having a form of godli- 
ness, but denying the power thereof." 2 Tim. iii: 
4, 5; so that both a God-defying world and an 
apostate church, Papal and Protestant, are busily 
engaged in preparing the way for the advent of 
the Antichrist. 



74: TILL HE COME. 



Wliat is our sweetest joy? 

Beloved companion, say; 
What our delightful, best employ, 
Untiring, free from all alloy, 

In this dark, cloudy day? 
To speak together of our home, 
Looking for Him who soon will come. 

Where do our spirits find 

Refreshment and repose? 
When heart to heart, and mind to mind, 
We search those records God designed, 

To medicine all our woes; 
And feel as bright, its pages shine. 
Each line was traced by Love divine. 

We look on all around 

As soon to disappear; 
We listen to the tempest's sound. 
As wildly now it sweeps around, 

Without an anxious fear; 
We hear a voice amidst its swell 
Which whispers, "All will soon be well!' 

Yes, soon the Lord will come; 

Then will all trouble cease; 
Earth's kingdoms will His own become; 
Proud Antichrist will meet his doom; 

All will be joy and peace: 
These very storms prepare His way. 
And usher in that glorious day. 



;kaiol. 75 



CHAPTER YIIL 



israp:l. 

THE story is told of Erederick tlie Great that lie 
abruptly said to liis Court Chaplain, '^give 
me an argument for the trnth of the Bible in a 
sinoie word." The man without a moment's hesi- 
tation replied, " Israel." The same word is the 
key that unlocks the meaning of the prophetic 
Scriptures, and those who do not see the place 
Israel occupies in God's word and in his purposes 
for the future, must at best go in a blundering 
way through the inspired writings. They are like 
the unbelieving Jews of whom the apostle speaks: 
" Their minds were blinded, for until this day 
remaineth the same vail untaken away in the 
reading; of the Old Testament." 2 Cor. iii:14. 

From Moses to Malachi, and from Matthew to 
Revelation, there is abundant and unvarying testi- 
mony that the literal descendants of the literal 
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, shall be litei-ally 
scattered among all nations, as a punishment for 
their sins, and in the last days shall be literally 
restored to their own land, and rejoice once more 
in their covenant relations to Jehovah, as the head of 
the millennial nations. The passages affirming this 
are so numerous it would require a book of consid- 
erable size to reproduce them, nor can they be set 
aside by tlie idle fancy tliat they refer to the return 
of a few thousand Jews from the Babylonian cap- 



76 TILT. UK rOME. 



tivity or that they are fulfilled spiritually to tlie 
churcli. 

Long- after the return from Babylon, the Lord 
Jesus said to the efews, '* Heliold, your house is 
left unto you desolate. For I say uuto you, ye 
shall not see lue henceforth, till ye shall say, 
Blessed is lie that conieth in the name of the 
Lord." Matt. xxiii:B8, 39. If tliis does not mean 
that they shall see Ilim again, and then they shall 
say. Blessed is lie that cometh in the name of the 
Lord, language has no meaning. The prediction 
did not rehite to ILis appearance after Ills resur- 
rection nor to the descent of the Spirit on the day 
of Pentecost, for in the first ])lace they did not see 
Him hut only His disciples; in the second place 
they did not say, Blessed is He that cometh in the 
name of the Lord ; and in the third place their 
house was left unto them more desolate than 
before. It remains therefore to be fulfilled at 
Christ's second coming. 

On another occasion our Lord said: "Jerusalem 
shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the 
times of the Gentiles be fulfilled." Luke xxi:24. 
[N^otwithstanding the malicious attempt of Julian, 
the apostate, and the tremendous efforts of the 
crusaders to defeat the prediction, Jerusalem 'con- 
tinues to be trodden down of the Gentiles. But 
words have no significance if the word until does 
not point to a day when Jerusalem shall cease to 
be trodden down of the Gentiles, and handed back 
to the Jews, or become uninhabited. 

Li the only council of the Apostles of which 
there is any record, James voiced the opinion of 
the others when he said, " Simeon [that is, BeterJ 



ISRAEL. 77 



liatli declared how God at the hrst did visit the 
Gentiles, to take out of them a people for His 
name/' or, as we Avonld say, the church, the called- 
out ones, the ecclesla^ " a Greek word,'' as J)r. 
Josepli Addison Alexander tells us, " which accord- 
ing to its etyniology means something called out^ 
or evoked, and by implication called tocjethei\ or 
convoked, as a separate assembly or society, selected 
from a greater 7iuraher.^^ God never had any 
other purpose through the preaching of the gospel 
in the present age, or if He had. His purpose lias 
been dreadftilly baffled. " And to this agree the 
words of the prophets," all of tlie prophets, although 
but one is quoted; '^ as it is written. After tliis I 
will return." After what? After He has taken 
out of the Gentiles a people for His name. " After 
this I will return," and Avlien He says, I will 
return, He means, I will return. When He 
returns, what will He do? "And will build again 
the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and 
I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set 
it up." Once more, then. He will take poor Israel 
into covenant relationship with Himself, and with 
what object and result? " That the residue of men 
might seek after the Lord, and ALL the Gentiles, 
upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, 
who doetli all these thingrs." Acts, xv:14-17. 

We are not surprised, therefore, to find the Holy 
Ghost Avriting by the pen of Paul concerning 
Israel, '' If the fall of them be the riches of the 
world, and the diminishing [decay or loss] of them 
the riclies of the Gentiles, how much more their 
fulness?" .... For if tlie casting away of them be 
the reconciling of tlie world, what shall the receiv- 



78 TILL HE COME. 



ing of them be, but life from the dead ? . . . . For I 
"svonkl not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of 
this mystery, lest ye should be Arise in your own 



conceits; that blindness 
happened to Israel, unti 



:)r hardness] in part has 
the fulness of the Gen- 



tiles be come in. And so all Isrr/cl shall be saved ; 
as it is written, There shall COME out of Sion the 
Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from 
Jacob. ''Kom. xi:12-26. 

The fulness of the Gentiles means, of course, 
the complete number God takes out of the Gen- 
tiles to be " a people for His name," answering to 
"the times of ihe Gentiles," of which our Lord 
speaks. So the divine procedure is as follows: 
First, the call of Israel; second, the call of tlie 
church ; third, the setting aside of both for unfaith- 
fulness; fourth, the personal return of the Lord; 
fifth, the salvation of all Israel; sixth, the salva- 
tion of all Gentiles, at least in outward confession; 
seventh, the millennial kino;dom of a tliousand 
years. Or, as the late Dr. Hugh McNeil well put 
it: "There are four steps in the conversion of the 
world : some flews, some Gentiles, the nation of 
Israel, and the nations of the Gentiles. Some 
Jews, called 'a remnant according to the election 
of grace;' some Gentiles, called 'a people taken 
out for His name' — these are both one in Christ, 
and form the church. Tlien the nation of Israel, 
on tlie return of tlie Lord; tluMi tlie Gentile 
nations." 

Hence we might expect to discover in the Old 
Testament the plainest and most explicit promises 
of Tsraers restoration to tlicir own laii<l, and of 
their return into covenant relation and privilege 



ISKAEL. 79 



and obligation as the peculiar people of Jeliovali. 
Tlie threat to scatter them aniong; the Gentiles Avas 
literally executed; the promise to restore them will 
be as literally accomplished. '' And yet for all 
that, when they be in the land of their enemies, I 
will not cast them away, neither will I abhor them, 
to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant 
with them; for I am the Lord their God.'" Lev. 
xxvi:33, 44. This unconditional covenant, which 
was confirmed by oath and is therefore unchange- 
able, guarantees to them a specific body of land, 
mentioned again and again, that stretches from 
the river Kile, up the Mediterranean coast, and 
eastward to the Euphrates, 600 miles from north 
to south, and about 1,200 miles in its widest 
breadth, containing at least 300,000 square miles, 
and capable of supplying the wants of many mil- 
lions of people. The Israelites have never yet 
possessed tliis vast territory, and as God is true 
they shall possess it hereafter. 

In another passage, after a long chapter crowded 
with frightful woes, it was said to Israel, '' If any 
of thine be driven out unto the utmost parts of 
heaven, from tlience Avill the Lord thy God gather 
thee, and from tlience will lie fetch thee; and the 
Lord thy God will bring thee into the land which 
thy fathers possessed, and thou slialt possess it; 
and He will do thee good, and multiply thee above 
thy fathers." Dent. xxx:4, 5. "Thy people also 
shall ])e all righteous; tliey shall inlierit the land 
forever." Isa. lx;21. Of Jerusalem God says, "it 
shall not be plucked up, nor tlirown down, any 
more forever." Jer. xxxi:31-4(). ^-In those days 
shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell 



80 TILL HE COME, 



safely; and tliis is the name whereby she shall l)e 
called, The Lord onr liigliteoiisness.' Jer. xxxiii: 
15-26. ^'Thus saith the Lord God, I will even 
gather you from the people, and assemble you out 
of the countries where ye ha\e l)een scattered, and 
I Avill give you the land of Israel." Ezek. xi:16-20. 
" The chiklren of Israel shall abide many days 
without a king, and without a prince, and without 
a sacrifice, and without an image [margin, stand- 
ing], and without an ephod, and without teraphim. 
Afterv/ard shall the children of Israel reticrn, and 
seek the Lord tlieir God, and David their King, 
and shall fear the Lord and His goodness iti the 
latter daysy Hos. iii:4, 5. The Jewish Rabbi 
Kimchi strikingly says, " These are the days of 
the captivity in which we now are at this day; Ave 
have no king nor prince out of Israel, for we are 
in the power of tlie nations and of their kings and 
princes; and have no sacrifice for God, nor image 
for idols; no ephod for God tliat declares future 
things by IJrim and Thummim, and no teraphim for 
idols, which show thingrs to come, accordino; to 
the mind of those that believe in them." 

" Ye shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, 
and that I am the Lord your God, and none else, 
and my people shall never ,be ashamed. And it 
shall come to pass afterxoard that I will pour out 
my Spirit upon all fiesli." Joel iii:26-32. " I will 
bring again the captivity of my people of Israel, 
and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit 
them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink 
the wine thereof; they shall make gardens, and eat 
the fruit of tliem. And I will plant them upon 
their land, and they shall no more be pulled \\\\ 



ISRAEL. SI 



out of their land, which I have given them, saith 
the Lord God." Amos ix:8-15. " Behold, the days 
come, saith the Lord, that I will sow the house of 
Israel, and tlie house of Judali, with the seed of 
man, and with tlie seed of beast. And it sliall 
come to pass, that like as I have watched over 
them, to pluck up, and to break down, and to 
tlirow down, and to destroy, and to afflict ; so will 
I Avatch over them, to build and to plant, saith 
the Lord." Jer. xxxi:23-40. 

There are scores upon scores of similar state- 
ments, equally plain and positive in the promise 
that the literal seed of Jacob shall in the latter 
days be returned to the lan,d which God gave to 
their fathers. But how do we know that the 
promises do not refer to the return from Babylon? 
Because they look to a second restoration, and 
because since that time Israel has been plucked up 
out of the land. " It shall come to pass in that 
day, that the Lord shall set His hand again the 
second time to recover the remnant of His people; 
.... and he shall set up an ensign for the nations, 
and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel and gather 
together the dispersed of Judah from the foiir 
corners of the earth. The envy also of Ephraim 
shall depart, and the adversaries of Judah shall be 
cut off; Ephraim shall not envy Judali, and Judah 
shall not vex Ephraim." Isa, xi:ll-16. "Thus 
saith the Lord God, behold, I will take the chil- 
dren of Israel from among the heathen, Avhither 
tliey be gone, and will gather them on every side, 
and l)ring them into their own land: and I will 
make them one nation in the land upon the moun- 
tains of Israel, and one King shall be King to 



82 TILL HE COME. 



tliem all, and they sliall be no more two nations 
[Jndali and the ten tribes], neitlier shall they be 
divided into two kingdoms any more at all." Ezek. 
xxxvii:15-28. 

There are many similar statements which tlie 
reader is entreated to look up for himself; and, if 
the subject is new to him, he will be amazed at 
the number of clear, explicit, unconditional pre- 
dictions of Israel's restoration to the land, and to 
the favor of Jehovah, which has been utterly for- 
feited. " I will take you from among the heathen, 
and gather you out of all countries, and will bring 
you into your own land .... Ye sliall dwell in the 
land that I gave to your, fathers ; and ye shall be 
my people, and I will be your God .... Not for 
your sakes do I this, saith the Lord God, be it 
known unto you: be ashamed and confounded for 
your own ways, O house of Israel." Ezek. xxxvi: 
24-28, 32. It is grace all the way through, and 
therefore " He that scattered Israel will gather 
him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth liis flock." 
Jer. xxxiilO. If the scattering is literal, so is the 
gathering. Israel and Jerusalem are mentioned 
hundreds of times in the Bible, and in every 
instance they mean the natural posterity of Jacob 
and the capital of Judah, except in tlie two or 
three verses where we read " Above," " Heavenly," 
'' Kew," as descriptive of a spiritual city. 

Israel, however, will be brouglit to God, only 
throuo^li terrible iudo;ments. "Thus saith the 
Lord God, because ye are all become dross, behold, 
therefore, I will gather you into the midst of Jern- 
salem. As they gathei" silver, and lu'ass, andiron, 
and lead, and tin, into tlit^ midst of the lire to 



ISKAEL. 83 



blow upon it, to melt it; so will I gather you in 
my anger and in my fury, and I will leave you 
tliere, and melt you." Ezek. xxii:19, 20. "Alas!" 
for that day is great, so that none is like it; it is 
even the time of Jacob's trouble; but he shall be 
saved out of it." Jer, xxx:7. ''And at that time 
shall Michael stand up, the great prince that 
standeth for the children of thy people; and there 
shall be a time of trouble, sucli as never was since 
there was a nation even to that same time; and at 
that time thy people shall be delivered, every one 
that shall be found written in the book." Dan- 
xii:l. '* I will gather all nations against Jerusalem 
to battle; and tlie city shall be taken, and the 
houses rifled, and the women ravished ; and half 
the city shall go forth in captivity, and the residue 
of the people sliall not be cut off from the city. 
Then shall the Lord go fortli, and fight against 
those nations, as when He fought in the day of 
battle. And His feet shall stand in that day upon 
the mount of Olives, wdiich is before Jerusalem on 
the east; ... .and tlie Lord my God sliall come, 
and all the saints witli Him.... And tlie Lord 
shall be King over all the earth: in that day shall 
there be one Lord, and His name one." Zech. xi v :l-9. 
In. the time of Jacob's trouble Antichrist will 
play a conspicuous part. '' He shall speak great 
words against the Most High, and shall wear out 
the saints of the Most High, and thiuk to change 
times and laws: and they shall be given into his 
hand, until a time, and times, and the dividincr of 

111 o 

time." Han. vii :2b. " He shall confirm a covenant 
with many for one heptad, aiul in the midst of the 
heptad [leaving 3^ years, 1,200 days, forty and tv\"0 



84 TILL HE COME. 



montlis, a time, times, and the dividing of time] 
lie shall canse the sacrifice and oblation to cease, 
and upon the battlements shall be the idols of the 
desolator, even until the consmnmation, and that 
determined shall be poured upon the desolator." 
Dan. ix:27. He will invade the land at the head 
of an immense host; but it is said to him, " Thou 
shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and 
all thy bands, and the people that is with thee: I 
will give thee unto the ra\enous birds of every 
sort, and to the beasts of the field; to be devoured." 
Ezek. xxxix:4. At the appearing of the KING 
OF KINGS, AND LOED OF LOKDS, a call is 
made to all the fowls that fly in the midst of 
heaven, " Come and gather yoursehes together 
unto the supper of the great God; that ye may 
eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, 
and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of 
horses." Rev. xix:16-18. The name of Jerusa- 
lem ''from that day shall be The Lord is there." 
Ezek. xlviii:35. Then, too, " He shall cause them 
that come of Jacob to take root : Israel shall blos- 
som and bud, and fill the face of the earth with 
fruit." Isa. xxvii:6. 

No one can read the word of God with an un- 
prejudiced mind, and with a sincere desire to know^ 
the truth, without seeing that the salvation of 
Israel has a direct bearing upon the salvation of 
the world. We hear the cry of Israel, " God be 
merciful unto US, and bless T'S; and cause His 
face to shine upon US," and what then? "That 
Thy way may be known upon earth, Thy saving 

health among all ])eoph^ God sliall bless l^S; 

and all the ends of the eartli sliall fear Ilim."' Fs. 



ISRAEL 85 



Ixvii. So we are plainly told that *' when the Lord 
shall build up Zion, He shall APPEAK in His 
glory;" But for what purpose? " To declare the 
name of the Lord in Zion, and llis praise in Jeru- 
salem; when the people are gatliered together, and 
the kingdoms, to serve the Lord." Ps. cii:16-22. 
He therefore is doing most to hasten the universal 
triumph of the cross, who most literally obeys the 
injunction of the Holy Ghost, "Pray for the 
peace of eJerusalem: they shall prosper that love 
thee." Ps. cxxii:(3. Tlie promise shall surely be 
fulfilled to the daughter of Zion, " unto thee shall it 
come, even the first dominion; tlie kinmlom shall 
come to the daughter of Jerusalem." Mic. iv:6-8. 
It is strange that brethren wdio deny the literal 
restoration of Israel do not see that God must have 
preserved this extraordinary people for some won- 
derful purpose. For 2500 years the four great 
world empires, and the kingdoms of Christendom, 
have sought to crush them, and at this day the 
most gigantic despotism of earth is trying to 
grind them to powder. But all of this is but the 
outworking of Jehovah's plans, "till He make 
Jerusalem a praise in the earth." Isa. lxii:7, when 
" ten men shall take liold, out of all lano-uao-es of 
the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of 
him that is a Jew^, saying. We will go with you; 
for we have heard that God is with you." Zech. 
viii:23. "Then the moon shall be confounded, 
and the sun ashamed, wdien the Lord of hosts shall 
reign in mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before 
His ancients, gloriously." Isa. xxiv:23. Even now 
the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob, 
the covenant keeping God, is preparing the way 



86 TILL HE COME. 



for the return of tlieir pobteritj to tlie land of their 
Fathers. From twenty to fifty Jewish families 
are landed every week at Jaffa, and the four lines 
of steamers from Constantinople and Russian ports 
are crowded witli refugees w^lio have already taken 
possession of Jerusalem. In the increasing fer- 
tility of the soil, and in the remarkable return of 
the chosen people, God is beginning to give back 
to them, although still blind, ^' the City of the 
great King." Matt. v:35. 

"Rejoice ye with ^Jerusalem! 

Tier iiigiit of tears is o'er; 
Now comes her hour of glorious power, 

And splendor evermore. 
Rejoice ye with Jerusalem! 

City of peace and light; 
Her morn at last is breaking fast, 

And ended is her night. 

Her widow's weeds are gone, 
Her royal robes put on. 

Ye who have read upon her walls 

The guilt, the curse, the shame, 
Now full in view see fair and new 

Her everlasting name. 
Ye who have read upon her towers 

The vengeance from above. 
Read now in light the sentence bright 

Of pardon and of love. 

Forgiven and comforted, 
She lifts her joyful head. 

The sun of earth she needeth not, 

Nor asks his light again; 
Jehovah is her Sun of bliss 

Her God her glory then. 
Her moon again shall never wane, 

Nor shall her sun descend, 
Her storms are done, her calm begun, 

Her mourning is at end. 

Her long, long fast is done, 
Her long, long feast begun." 



THE RAPTUHK. ^1 



CHAPTER IX. 



THE RAPTURE. 



THE question now to be discussed touches vitally 
the entire subject of our Lord's second 
ad\'ent. Many beloved and excellent brethren 
hold that there is no perceptible interval between 
His coming f}rr His people and His appearing 
with them. They believe, therefore, that the 
church, the true church, the regenerated ones who 
are seeking to walk in fellowship with Christ, and 
in separation from evil, must pass through the ter- 
rible tribulation under the Antichrist in the last 
days, before they are caught up in clouds to meet 
the Lord in the air. But there is strong ground 
for very serious objections to this theory, wdiatever 
affection and respect may be due to those by whom 
it is advanced. 

In the first place, it renders null and void all 
the commands of the Saviour, and of His Apos- 
tles, to look for His coming as possible any day. 
It can not be denied that we are to be watching 
for His return at even, at midnight, at the cock 
crowing, in the morning, Mark xiii:36, 37. It 
can not be denied that every real believer is to be 
like a faithful servant standing at the hall door 
with girded loins and burning lights, peering 
through the outer darkness for the iirst gleam of 
His advancing glory, and listening with attentive 
ear for the faintest echo of His approaching steps. 



88 



TILL HE COME. 



Lii. xii:35, 36. It can not be denied that the 
Christians of the apostles' times were taught to 
wait for (irod's Son from heaven. 1 Thess. i:lQ, and 
were found " waiting for the coming of our Lord 
Jesus Christ." 1 Cor. i:7. But if He can not 
come until the restoration of the Jews in large 
numbers to Jerusalem, until the division of the 
old Roman empire into ten kingdoms, to be fol- 
lowed by the appearing of the Antichrist, it is 
useless to be looking for Him now. Beyond ques- 
tion, accordintr to the teacliinps of the New Testa- 
ihent from Mattliew to tlie close of Revelation, it 
is the proper posture of the soul to be expecting 
Him every hour, as we need Him " every hour," 
and that can not be a true doctrine which disturbs 
this beautiful posture, and makes it impossible. 
In the second place, it will not be denied that 
when our Lord appears on this earth, His saints 
shall appear with Him. " The Lord my God shall 
come, and all the saints with Him." Zech. xiv:5. 
" When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then 
shall ye also appear with Him in glory." Col. iii:4. 
''At the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all 
His saints." 1 Thess. iii:13. "If we believe that 
Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which 
sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him." 1 Thess. 
iv:14. "Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thou- 
sands of His saints." Jude 14. '^ The armies 
which were in heaven followed Him upon white 
horses, clothed in line linen, white and clean," and 
"the line linen is the righteousness of saints," and 
" they that ai'e with Him are called, and chosen, 
and faithful," identifying them with saved men 
from the earth, Rev. xix:14, 8; x\ii:14. Such 



THE RAPTURE. 89 



passages teach beyond doubt tliat those who are 
manifested with Him at His advent must have 
been previously caught up unto Hiiu; and a sufH- 
cient k^igth ot* time must iiave ehipsed to reckon 
witli His servants, according to their faithfuhiess, 
Matt. xxv:14-24; Lu. xix:12-19, and to be jndged 
according to the deeds done in the body, 2 Cor. v: 
10; because when lie finally appears they shall be 
associated Avith Him in the administration of His 
kingdom. " Do ye not know that the saints shall 



VI 



9 



judge the world?" 1 Cor. 

In the third place, our Lord plainly promises to 
keep IHs watchful ones out of the tribulation. 
Speaking of that tribulation, when there shall be 
" upon the earth distress of nations, with perplex- 
ity; the sea and the waves roaring, men's hearts 
failing them for fear, and for looking after those 
things which are coming on the earth," He says to 
His disciples, " Take heed to yourselves, lest AT 
AXY TIME your hearts be overcharged with sur- 
feiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, 
and so that day come upon you unawares. For as 
a snare shall it come on all them that dw^ell [are 
settled down] on the face of the whole earth. 
Watch ye, therefore, and pray always, that ye may 
be accounted tvorthy to escape all these things that 
shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of 
man."Lu. xxi:26-36. Again He promises still 
more explicitly, '' Because thou hast kept the word 
of my patience, I also will keep thee from [out of] 
the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all 
the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth." 
Kev. iii:10. Here, then, is the positive assurance 
tliat the faithful shall be kept, not by His power 



90 



TILL HE rOME. 



til rough tlie tribulation, but out of the. hour, else- 
where rendered •• time *' and - season," of the trib- 
ulation, that shall burst like a storm upon all the 
woi'ld. 

In the fourth place, after the Laodicean or last 
state of professing Christendom, when lukewarm 
indifference and pride and boasting prevail, and 
Christ is excluded from His own house. Rev iii, 
the church is seen no more upon the earth, until 
she appears in the 19th chapter, following her 
Bridegroom from heaven. On the other hand, the 
representatives of the redeemed, are in heaven. The 
entire interval between the close of the church age 
and the marriage supper of the Lamb is filled with 
appalling j udgments, and the whole scene is in- 
tensely Jewish, as shown in the sealing of '*an 
hundred and forty and four thousand of all the 
children of Israel," the temple, the court of the 
Gentiles, the testimony of the two witnesses, who 
like the Old Testament prophets, devour their ene- 
mies with fire, and have power to shut heaven, that 
it rain not, and have power over waters to turn 
them to blood, and to smite the earth with all 
plagues. There is not a hint that the church is 
here during the period of awful tribulation ; and 
even tlie Holy Spirit is not viewed as officially 
upon the earth, but takes His place before the 
throne, Eev. i:4; iv:5; v:6. 

In the fifth place, we are distinctly taught that 
when our Lord leaves the right hand of the throne 
of God, He pauses long enough in the air to gather 
His risen and translated saints around Himself. 
" The Lord Himself shall descend from heaven 
with a shout, .... aiul the dead in Christ shall rise 



TUK RAriURK. 01 



first; then Ave Avliich are alive and remain, shall be 
caught up together with them in the clouds, to 
meet the Lord in the air.'' 1 Thess. iv:16, 17. 
Apart from the fact that the word '' sliout " is, as 
Canon Fausset renders it, '• a signal shout," a mili- 
tary call and command to His own, with which 
others have no concern ; and apart from the fact 
that the word "meet," wherever else it occurs in 
the New Testament, implies a meeting so as to 
return with tlie person met, it is certain that there 
are two stacres in our Lord's second advent. He 
comes into tlie air, and there summons His own to 
meet Llim, and then He comes with them to the 
earth. There are not two comings, but two steps 
of one coming, as there were two steps of LHs first 
coming, the one at Bethlehem and the other at 
Calvary. It is not stated in so many w^ords how 
long the pause in the air will be, nor wdiy it occurs, 
but it may be inferred from many Scriptures that 
it will continue for seven years, during the mani- 
festation of the Anticlirist's power. 

In the sixth place, the analogy of Scriptures 
favors the two-fold aspect in which the second 
advent is to be viewed. There is a personal and 
invisible relation of truth to God, and an open and 
outward manifestation of it to the world. We are 
justified before God without works of any kind, 
Rom. iY:5; but we are justified before men by our 
works, Jas. ii:24. AVe are sanctified before God 
now", 1 Cor. vi:ll; but we are sanctified before men 
progressively, 1 Thess. iv:3; v:23. The Holy 
Spirit always dwells in the believer as he stands 
before God, Jno. xiv:17; but the Lloly Spirit 
comes upon him for service and testimony before 



92 TILL HE COME. 



men, Acts i:8. The believer sliall not come into 
judgment as to liis sins, Jno. v:24; but the believer 
murst appear before the judgment seat of Christ as 
to his works, 2 C^or. v:10. There is to be a resur- 
rection of the iust in glorified bodies, and hence 
Paul's earnest desire, "if by any means I might 
attain unto the outresurrection, that one from 
among the dead." Phil, iiirll; but there is to be a 
resurrection of tlie unjust a thousand years after- 
wards, Pev. XX :5. We might expect, therefore, to 
find that tliere is to l)e a coming of the Lord for 
His people, and then, whether the delay is long or 
short, His appearing with them, thus bringing the 
two phases of tlie second advent into harmony with 
other great doctrines. 

In the seventh place. He has shown us that the 
rapture or translation is to be secret and unknown 
to the world, and that His summons to His own 
will not be heard, or at least not understood, by 
the unbelieving mass. "Enoch walked with God; 
and he was not, for God took him." Gen. v:24, 
and no man saw him ascend ; but he was kept out 
of the hour of temptation, while Noah passed 
safely through the tribulation. When Elijah was 
caught away in a chariot of fire, only Elisha saw 
it, and the sons of the prophets searched in 'vain 
for the missing messenger of Jehovah. Jesus on 
His way to the cross cried, " Father, glorify Tliy 
name. Then came there a voice from heaven, 
saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it 
again." This was distinct enough to His ear, but 
the people that stood by said " that it thundered." 
Jno. XX ii:28. Paul on liis way to Damascus 
heard the words of oi v risen and ascenck^d l^ord, 



THE RAPTrRE. 93 



" I am Jesus, whom tliou persecntest Arise, 

and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what 
thou must do. And the men which journeyed 
with him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but 
seeing no man." Acts ix:4-7. Afterward Paul 
said, '' They that were witli me saw indeed the 
light, and were afraid; but they heard not the 
voice of Him that spake to me.'' Actsxxii:9. 

Is there then a contradiction here, as infidels in 
and out of the church have been saying for centu- 
ries? ^'o greater contradiction that when persons, 
listening to a speaker in a large audience, assert 
that they do not hear him, although his voice fills 
the building. It needs a circumcised ear and a 
circumcised heart to hear the words of the Lord, 
since "the natural man receiveth not the things 
of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto 
him; neither can he know them, because they are 
spiritually discerned." 1 Cor. ii:14. Even if the 
shout of our descending Lord is heard by the 
unbelievinor world, it will not be heard in the 
scriptural sense of the word; and no doubt many 
a jest and scientific guess will appear in the news- 
papers about the strange sound in the sky, none 
but the elect knowing that it called His waiting 
and watching ones to meet LLim in the air. 

He comes into the air as the Bridegroom, Matt. 
xxv-6; He comes to the earth as the Xobleman 
who " went into a far country to receive for Him- 
self a Kiucrdom, and to return." Lu. xix:12. He 
comes into the air as ''The Morning Star," Rev. 
xxii:16; He comes to the earth as ''The Sun of 
Righteousness.'' Mai. iv:2. He comes into the 
air to present tlie cliurcli to Himslf, all glorious, 



94 TILL HE COME. 



Eph. v:27; He comes to the earth to overthrow the 
armies of all nations gathered against Jerusalem 
to battle. Zech. xiv;2, 3. He comes into the air in 
blessed fuliillment of the promise, I will " receive 
yon nnto Myself," Jno. xiv:3; He comes to the 
earth as KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF 
LOKDS. Kev. xix:16. He comes into the air to 
celebrate "the marriage supper of the Lamb," 
Hev. xix:9; He comes to tlie earth to prepare "the 
supper of the great God." Kev. xix:17. He comes 
into the air to bring His faithful ones to the ban- 
queting house, where His banner over them is 
love. Song ii :4 ; He comes to the earth to give 
them power over the nations, and they shall rule 
them with a rod of iron ; as the vessels of a potter 
shall they be broken to shivers. Kev. iii:26. He 
comes into the air for the joy of His followers, 
Jno. xvi:22; He comes to the earth to judge the 
nations. Matt. xvi:31; Acts xvii:31. 

There is no predicted event between this passing 
moment and His comino; into the air, but much 
remains to be fiiliilled before He comes to the 
eartli. It would be scriptural to say, the Lord 
7ncf(/ come to-day, or tomorrow, or next week, or 
next month, or next year; it would be unscriptural 
to say, the Lord ^vill not come to-day, nor tomor- 
row, nor next week, nor next month, nor next 
year. If to the statement it is objected that He 
Himself tells us, "This gospel oip the kingdom 
shall be preached in all tlie world for a witness unto 
all nations, and then shall the end come," Matt. 
xxiv:14, it is a sufficient answer to reply that the 
Farther alone has authority to determine when this 
testimony to His Son sliall have heon sntHciently 



THE RAPTURE. 95 



borne, Acts i:7; and since it is revealed that after 
our Lord's coming^ to the earth, the saved of Israel 
shall rush as His ambassadors to the isles that are 
afar off, that have not heard His fame, nor seen 
His glory, Isa. lxvi:19, it is certain that the gospel 
will not have been preached to every creature 
before His coming into the air. 

The fact is that we of this cliurch dispensation 
have nothino- to do with siorns and dates, and it is 
dangerous and delusive to get our thoughts fixed 
upon tliese. It is most important to remember 
that the Holy Spirit takes notice of ^' times and 
seasons " only with respect to Israel. Those who 
form the body of the risen Christ, and are ''par- 
takers of the heavenly calling," are timeless peo- 
ple, and need not study history. AYe are like an 
army when the General issues his orders, " Be ready 
to move at a moment's notice.'' Every inferior 
officer, and every soldier must be instantly prepared, 
and continue in a state of preparation, no matter 
how long the notice may be deferred, until the order 
to march is received. The Captain of our salvation 
has commanded us to wait and to watch, and it is 
not for us to be interposing certain events, nor to 
be looking around for fulfilled prophecy, before 
expecting to hear His order bidding us mount np 
in clouds to meet Him in the air. ^ ay, our rapture 
may be quicker than the twinkling of an eye, 1 
Cor. xv:22, for that means the closing and uplift- 
ing of tlie eyelid, but tlie Greek word may imply 
a single movement. O sweet thought! here one 
moment, and the next, like a flash, with the Lord. 
"Be y-^. therefore ready also: for the Son of man 
cometh at an liour when ye think not.'' Lu. xiiilO. 



Of) TILL HE rOME. 



I'm waiting for Thee, Lord, 
Thy beauty to see, Lord, 
I'm waiting for Thee, 
For Thy coming again. 
Thou'rt gone over there, Lord, 
A place lo prepare, Lord; 
Thy home I shall share. 
At Thy coming again. 

Mid danger and fear, Lord, 
I'm oft weary here. Lord; 
The day must be near 
Of Thy coming again. 
'Tis all sunshine there. Lord, 
No sighing nor care, Lord, 
Biit glory so fair 

At Thy coming again. 

Whilst Thou art awaj^, Lord, 
I stumble and stray, Lord; 
Oh, hasten the day 
Of Thy coming again. 
This is not my rest. Lord, 
A pilgrim confest. Lord, 
I wait to be blest 

At Thy coming again. 

Our loved ones before, Lord, 
Their troubles are o'er. Lord; 
I'll meet them once more 
At Thy coming again. 
The blood was the sign, Lord, 
That marked them as Thine, Lord, 
And brightly they'll shine 
At Thy coming again. 

E'en now let my ways, Lord, 
Be bright with Thy praise, Lord, 
For brief are the days 
Ere Thy coming again. 
I'm waiting for Thee, Lord, 
Thy beauty to see. Lord, 
No triumph for me 

Like Thy coining again. 



THAT lU.KSSKI) HOl'K. 



97 



CHAPTER X. 



THAT BLESSED HOPE. 



THERE are three things which grace does for the 
believer. It saves, it teaches, and it holds 
ont " a sure and certain hope " to animate the 
redeemed and instructed pilgrim on liis way to 
meet the Lord in tlie air. '' The grace of God that 
bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teach- 
ing ns, that, denying nngodliness and worldly 
lusts, we should live soberly, righteously and godly, 
in this present world, looking for that blessed hope, 
even the glorious appearing of our great God and 
Saviour Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, 
that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and 
purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of 
good works. ''These things speak," adds the 
apostle, including, among the things the faithful 
minister is to speak, '' that blessed hope." Tit. 
ii:ll-15. 

A glance at the Scriptures will be sufficient to 
show why it is called that blessed hope, and why 
Christians are represented as looking or waiting 
for it with eager expectation. Grace shines in our 
salvation, but there will be a forthshining of glory 
at the second coming of Christ, while between the 
first and the last step we are kept by the power of 
God, fullilling the promise of the Word, "T1k3 
Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord will give 
grace and glory.'' Fs. lxxxiv:ll. U the return of 



98 TILL HE COME. 



our Saviour from the lieaveus could be seen as a 
liappy hope, not as a terrible trial, no doubt many 
who now shrink from all mention of the subject 
would speak of it wdth exultant hearts and longing 
desire. 

First, consider the bearing of the second advent 
upon the creation around us. ^'The earnest ex- 
pectation of the creature |or creation] waiteth [to 
watch with the head stretched out] for the mani- 
festation of the sons of God. For the creation was 
made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason 
of him who hath subjected the same in hope; 
because the creation itself also shall be delivered 
from the bondage of corruption into the glorious 
liberty of the children of God. For we know that 
the wliole creation groaneth and travaileth together 
in pain until now. And not only they, but our- 
selves also, which have the lirst-fruits of the Spirit, 
even we ourselves groan within ourselves, Avaiting 
for the adoption, the redemption of our body." 
Kom. viii:19-23. 

Prof. Beet says: "The Creation is especially 
distinguished from the children of -God, and there- 
fore does not include them. The words 'subject' 
and 'groan' exclude the happy spirits of other 
worlds. The coming liberation excludes bad an- 
gels, and those Avho finally reject the gospel. For 
to the latter the coming of Christ vi'iW bring wrath, 
ii:8, and we cannot conceive it to bring liberty to 
the former. It remains therefore that the word 
denotes the entire world around us, living and 
without life, man alone excepted. It is what we 
call nature, but reminds us tliat nature is theAVork 



of God.'' \)v. Cliarles Iloclge takes the same 



THAT BLESSPJD HOl'E. 09 

view, and tells us, '^ The manifestion of the sons 
of God is a definite Scriptural event, just as much 
as the second advent of Christ," and " the time of 
the resurrection of tlie body or the manifestation of 
the sons of God, is the time of the second advent 
of Jesus Christ." With this all expositors of all 
schools cordially agree. 

It follows, therefore, that creation or nature can 
not cease from its groans and travailing throes 
until the second advent of Jesus Christ. Then, 
however, " the wilderness and the solitary place 
shall be glad for tliem; and the desert shall rejoice 
and blossom as the rose." Isa. xxxv:l. Then 
"the mountains and the hills shall break forth 
before you into singing, and all the trees of the 
field shall clap their hands." Isa. lv:12. There 
are many similar statements in the Scriptures, 
that lose all their signihcance and beauty for mul- 
titudes, because they are dismissed from the mind 
Avith the liippant remark that they are figurative 
and poetical. Suppose they are figurative and poet- 
ical; they are not lies, for the word of God con- 
tains no lie, and hence a glorious change awaits 
the now suffering creation at the second advent of 
Christ. If the figure or poetry is so enchanting, 
what must be the reality! 

Second, consider the bearing of the second advent 
upon the lov/er animals. '' The wolf also shall 
dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down 
with the kid ; and the calf, and the young lion and 
tlie fatling together; and a little child shall lead 
them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their 
young ones shall lie down together, and the lion 
shall eat straw like the ox. And the suckina 



100 TILL HE COME. 



cliilcl shall play on tlie liole of the asp, and the 
weaned child shall put his hand in the cockatrice 
den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my 
holy mountain, for the earth shall he full of the 
knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the 
sea." Isa. xi:6-9. The same truth is set forth, 
among other places, in Isa. lxv:25; Ezek. xxxiv:25; 
Hos. ii:18. That this lovely scene cannot be wit- 
nessed before the personal return of the Lord, is 
shown by the fact that it is introduced with the 
statement, "He shall smite the earth with the rod 
of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips shall 
He slay the wicked one," precisely the phraseology 
that describes His visible comingrin 2Thess. ii:8. 

Here again we are met with the objection that 
the language is figurative and poetical, and cannot 
mean Avhat it says, the scientific ones among the 
brethren arguing that a lion's teeth are not adapted 
to grass eating. True, nor is a man's, and yet 
" the same hour was the thing fulfilled upon 
l^ebuchadnezzar, and he was driven from men and 
did eat grass as oxen." Dan.iv:38. He who made 
the teeth can adapt the teeth to any purpose He 
pleases, and He who said to fallen Adam, " Cursed 
is the ground for thy sake," Gen. iii:17, can 
remove the curse, as He will do at the second com- 
ing of Christ, when the poor dumb beasts, so long 
the helpless victims of inhuman brutality and 
ruthless murder, will have tlie cruel yoke broken 
from their necks, and cease to tight with their 
tyrant and with one another. 

Third, consider the bearintr of tlie second advent 
upon civil governments. ^' He shall judge among 
the nations, and sliall rebidce many people; and 



THAT BLESSED HOPE. 101 



they shall beat their swords into plowshares and 
their spears into pruninghooks; nation sliall not 
lift np sword against nation, neither shall they 
learn war any more." Isa. ii:-!:. This testimony 
is so important that it is reproduced by the Holy 
Ghost in anotlier prophet, Mic- iv":3; and a pious 
Iloman Catholic, who wrote over the signature 
of Ben Ezra, in a remarkable work called the 
^' Coming of Messiah in Glory and Majesty," trans- 
lated from the Spanish by Edward Ir\ing, Avell 
says, "In the first ])lace I sincerely agree with all 
the doctors, both Christian and Jewish, that the 
times of Messiah are manifestly the times spoken 
of in this prophecy. ' It shall come to pass in the 
last days,' that is, in the time of Messiah, or of 
Christ. Therefore the prophecy, and many others 
like it, which have not been verified, nor could 
possibly have been, in the tii'st advent of the Mes- 
siah, may very well and must needs be verified in 
the second, which time is not less of divine faith 
than the first .... Wlien then the second advent, 
which we all religiously believe and expect, is ar- 
rived, there shall be, among other things, primary 
or principal, the elevation of Mount Zion above all 
the mountains and hills, a manifestly figurative 
expression, yet admirably proper to explain the 
dignity, honor and glory to which the city of 
David shall then be lifted up; after that the throne 
or tabernacle of David, which is fallen down, sliall 
have been set up and re-established therein, ' as in 
thedaysof old;'., .in which time consequently shall 
the nation s and peoples flow toward the top of Mount 
Zion. What nation and peoples? Without doubt 
those who shall be left after the coming of the Lord." 



102 TILL HE eOME. 



Fourth, consider the bearing of the second ad- 
vent npon scattered IsraeL To the daughter of 
Zion and to the daughter of Jeruselem it is said, 
" The King of Israel, even the Lord, is in tlie 
midst of thee; thou shalt not see evil any more. 
In that day it shall he said to Jerusalem, Fear thou 
not; and to Zion, Let not thine hands he slack. 
The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; 
He will save, He will rejoice over thee with joy; 
He will rest in His love; He will joy over thee 
Avith singing. I w^ill gather them that are sorrow- 
ful for tlie solemn assembly, who are of thee, to 
whom the reproach of it was a l)urden Behold, 
at that time I will undo all that afhict thee; and I 
will save her that halteth, and gather her that was 
driven out; and I will get them praise and fame 
in every land where they have been put to shame. 
At that time [at the time when the King of Israel 
even the Lord, is seen in the midst of the Jews], 
will I bring you again, even in the time that I 
gather you, for I will make you a name and a 
praise among all people of the earth, when I turn 
l)ack your captivity before your eyes, saith the 
Lord." Zeph. iii:15-20. 

Fifth, consider the bearing of the second advent 
upon sickness. " The inhabitant shall not say, I 
am sick," Isa. xxxiii:24; and the context shows 
that this shall be a time when "thine eyes shall 
see the King in His beauty; they shall behold a 
far stretching land," as the Eevised has it. " There 
shall be no more thence an infant of days, nor an 
old man that hath not filled his days : for the child 
shall die an hundred years old; but the sinner, be- 
ing an hundred years old, shall be accursed. And 



THAT r.LKSSKO IIOPK. 103 

they shall build houset^ and inhabit them; and they 
shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them. 
They shall not build and another inhabit; they 
shall not plant and another eat ; for as tlie days of 
a tree are the days of my people, and mine elect 
shall long enjoy the work of their hands." Isa. 
lxv:20-22. This is an earthly, not a lieavenly 
scene, for death is not wholly extinct, but it is 
exceptional, appearing only as a judicial inflic- 
tion. Man will then All liis days, whicli he never 
yet has done, nor even Methusaleh before the 
deluge. But tlien the righteous will live upon the 
earth for a thousand years, when the Lord reigns 
for a thousand years, and so long will be human 
life that one dying a hundred years old will be but 
a child, dying too, under some special curse. 

Sixth, consider the bearing of the second advent 
upon the state of our dead. " I would not have 
you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them 
which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others 
that have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus 
died and rose again, even so them also which sleep 
in Jesus will God bring with Him. For this we 
say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we 
whicli are alive and remain unto the coming of the 
Lord, shall not precede them which are asleep. 
For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven 
with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and 
with the trump of God; and tlie dead in Christ 
shall rise lirst; then we which are alive and remain 
shall be caught up together with them in the 
clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. And so shall 
we ever be with tlie Lord. Wherefore comfort 
one another with tliese words." 1 Thess. iv:13-18. 



104 



TILL UK COME. 



Where eke sliall we Unci comfort when our hearts 
are bursting over the graves of our darlings, whom 
we sliall see no more in the l)ody 'Mill Ilecomef 
Oh, it is then and there a new meaning is given 
to the precious promise, *' Surely I come quickly. 
Amen." And the sorrowingr soul calls hack with 
irrepressible longing, " Even so, come, Lord Jesus." 

Seventh, consider the bearing of the second ad- 
vent upon the conversion of tlie Avorld. It is when 
Israel are ])ack in their own land, and know that 
the Messiah Lord is in the midst of them, and they 
shall never be ashamed, the promise is fulfilled, 
" It shall come to pass AFTERWARD, that I will 
pour out my Spirit upon all iiesh." Joel ii:28. It 
is when He returns, and builds again the taber- 
nacle of David, which is fallen down, the residue 
of men seek after the Lord, " and all the Gentiles." 
Acts xv:14-17. It is after the sealing of the hun- 
dred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes 
of the children of Israel, the apostle beheld, and, 
lo, a great inultitude, which no man could num- 
ber, came out of the tribulation, the great one, un- 
der Antichrist, having washed their robes and 
made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Rev. 
vii. They ai-e not the church, for Christ has 
already come to call the real church to heaven as 
His bride, and she shall descend with Him. " Do 
ye not know that the saints shall judge the 
world?" 1 Cor. vi:2. 

It is not strange, therefore, that the glorious 
epiphany of the great God, our Saviour Jesus 
Christ, is called " that blessed hope," But it is 
strange and sad beyond expression that evei-y true 
Christian does not cry out for His comiiio- with 



THAT BLESSED HOPE. 105 

continual desire, when we Und tliat such a flood 
tide ot* honor and glory and praise shall flash 
before Ilis throne at llis advent, that such heiohts 
of blessedness sliall tlien l)e attained by ourselves, 
and that we are so hopeless without it. 

The Church lias waited long 
Her absent Lord to see; 
And still in loneliness she waits; 
A friendless stranger she. 
Age after age has gone, 
Sun after sun has set, 
And still in weeds of widowhood 
She weeps a mourner yet. 
Come, then. Lord Jesus, come. 

Saint after saint on earth 
Has lived, and loved, and died; 
And as they left us one by one, 
We laid them side by side; 
We laid them down to sleep, 
But not in hope forlorn; 
We laid them but to ripen there. 
Till the last glorious morn. 
Come, then. Lord Jesus, come. 

We long to hear Thy voice. 
To see Thee face to face. 
To share Thy crown and glory then. 
As now we share Thy grace. 
Should not the loving bride 
The absent Bridegroom mourn? 
Should she not wear the weeds of grief 
Until the Lord return? 
Come, then, Lord Jesus, come. 

The whole creation groans, 
And waits to hear that voice. 
That shall restore her comeliness, 
And make her wastes rejoice. 
Come, Lord, and wipe away 
The curse, the sin, the stain, 
And make this blighted world of ours 
Thine own fair world again. 
Come, then, Lord Jesus, come. 



lOG TILL HK COME. 



CIIAPTEK XI. 



THE ONLY HOPE. 



WHENEVER and wherever man has been 
placed in a position of responsibility he 
lias failed. Thns Ave find him in the garden of 
Eden, radiant Avith l)eanty, surrounded by every- 
thing that could make him perfectly happy, and 
subjected to a simple test of obedience. But he 
believed the devil's lie, rather than God's truth, 
and Avas sent forth to till a sin-cursed earth in the 
SAA^eat of his face, and to moulder back to dust. 
"Through one man sin entered into thcAvorld, and 
death throuo-h sin." Rom, a^:12. I^even ao^ain can 
he be tried nnder circumstances so faA'orable; and 
the first trial, the dispensation of Innocence, ended 
in utter disaster and ruin. 

This Avas followed by the dispensation of Con- 
science. There Avas no pronounced or written law, 
but he was left to his own sense of right and AATong 
to govern and judge his conduct. The result of 
the experiment is stated in the Avords, " God saAV 
that the Avickedness of man AA^as great in the earth, 
and that every imagination of the thoughts of his 
lieart Avas only evil continually." Gen. vi:5. 
'^ Ever}^," " only," " eAdl," " continually " tell the 
sad story of deep-seated depravity and Avide-spread 
departure from their Creator. There must have 
been millions of people on the earth at the time the 
wrath of God Avas let loose in a fiood to destroy the 



THE ONI.Y HOPE. 107 



race; but out of all this vast multitude there was 
but one righteous man, who, with his houseliohl, 
was saved. So the second trial ended in utter 
disaeter and ruin. 

Then came the dispensation of the Family. 
Scarcely had the w^aters of the deluge subsided, 
before man in his defiance of God determined to 
build a tower that might reach unto heaven. Al- 
thougli confounded in liis folly, lie soon forgot the 
destruction of the world and the overthrow of 
Babel, and relapsed into the former iniquity, until 
universal idolatry covered the earth. Terah, the 
father of Abraham, was an idolater when his son 
was called out from his country and kindred, to 
train his household in the knowledge of the true 
God. The most intimate and precious relations 
were established between Jeho^'ah and one who it 
three times called His friend, l)ut we find the pos- 
terity of this friend in the lime kilns of Egyps, 
groaning in the degradation of their slavery, and 
steeped in ignorance and unbelief. So the third 
trial ended in utter disaster and ruin. 

Xext we have the dispensation of the Law, when 
an entire nation was separated from all other na- 
tions, and told how to dress, and Avhat to eat, and 
when to observe their religious rites, and where to 
worship, the utmost pains being taken to guard 
them from the defilement of contact with the world. 
Yet their national annals, written by their own 
historians and prophets, contain an almost un- 
broken record of deliberate disobedience, of per- 
sistent and willful disregard of known commands, 
and of determined rebellion aorainst divine author- 
ity, until they were cast out of the land. When 



108 TILL HE COME. 



Christ came, an aged Simeon and Anna waited for 
the consolation of Israel, bnt with hardly an ex- 
ception the people had wholly departed from God. 
So the fourth trial ended in utter disaster and ruin. 
The dispensation of our Lord's personal ministry 
succeeded. The result of the new experiment may 
be described in the words, " He was in the world, 
and the world was made by Him, and the w^orld 
knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His 
own received Him not." Jno. i:9, 10. He per- 
formed the most mighty and the most convincing 
miracles almost Avithout num])er; He spake as 
never man did to thousands, and tens of thou- 
sands, but He won only a few followers, princi- 
pally among the poor and illiterate and debased; 
and when He was nailed to the cross a mockinor 

o 

inscription was placed above His head in Hebrew, 
Greek, and Latin, the language of religion, the 
language of culture, and the language of power. 
All that Jew, Greek and Roman did for God's 
dear Son was to give Him a inp^nger for a cradle, 
an instrument of torture on which to die, and a 
borrowed tomb to hold His mangled body. "He 
is despised and rejected of men." So the fifth 
trial ended in utter disaster and ruin. 

This brings us to the dispensation of the Spirit, 
so called because the Lloly Spirit has come to bear 
witness to Christ's ascension, to reprove the world, 
to help believers as their abiding Comforter, to 
baptize all true saints into one body, of which our 
exalted Lord is the head. But so far as salvation 
is concerned, it is no more the dispensation of the 
Spirit than any former age, for every child of man 
who has been redeemed since Adam's day, lias been 



THE ONLY IIOI'P:. 109 



saved by the Spirit tliroiigli faith. Human nature 
and human need are precisely the same they have 
been from the fall of our first parents to this pres- 
ent time. It is clearly, therefore, not a question 
of the competency of the Spirit to save all men, nor 
of the adaptation of the Gospel to all men, but of 
the divine purpose as revealed in the inspired 
Scriptures. 

If any one can show a line in these Scriptures 
from the first of Genesis to the last of Revelation, 
which promises the conversion of the world by the 
agencies now employed, it becometh pre-millenial- 
iots to retire at once into silence and into seclusion 
from the field of controversy. Many a prominent 
preacher and professor boldly asserts that this dis- 
pensation of the Spirit has been appointed to bring 
the whole world to Christ. He is challenged to 
make good the assertion by the living word of 
God. " Let him now speak, or else hereafter for- 
ever hold his peace." Even he Avill admit that if 
such is the purpose of God, it has been terribly 
defeated for more than eighteen liundred and fifty 
years; if such was tlie design of the dispensation, 
it has miserably failed. 

In the first place, although Christianity for the 
first three hundred years of our era rolled like a 
wave of blessing across tlie known and habitable 
globe, scarcely a trace of it is left wliere it was 
originally victorious. Churches by hundreds and 
thousands througliout Southern Europe, Northern 
Africa and AVestern Asia, were planted l)y the 
hands of the Apostles or their immediate successors, 
and enriched with the blood of martyrs; but they 
have entirely disappeared from the face of the 



110 TILL HE COME. 



earth. The ground they occupied is as barren as 
lieathenism. Remember that this occurred in the 
dispensation of the Spirit, as did the utter corrup- 
tion of the church, cuhninating under Constantine, 
and spreading over Christendom like a black cloud, 
that for more than a thousand years was broken 
here and there by only a single ray of light. 

In the second place, the Reformation was speed- 
ily followed by rationalism, and the country that 
gave birth to the former is now the home of the 
latter. Within an incredibly short period after 
Luther's departure Jesus could have said to the 
most of Protestantism, as He said to the church at 
Sardis, " I know thy works, that thou hast a name, 
that thou livest, and art dead." It took three 
hundred years to arouse the cold, formal, lifeless 
mass to any sense of obligation to carry the gospel 
to the perishing millions of our race, and although 
the century now closing has been signalized by an 
enormous expenditure of money and of tlie lives of 
men on the foreign field, and altliough, blessed be 
God, about 3,000,000 have professed the Christian 
faith, there are 200,000,000 more to be converted 
than at the beginning of the century. The churcli 
in heathen lands does not begin to keep pace with 
the natural increase by birtli of the Pagan and 
Mohammedan population. Tlie Rev. James John- 
ston, a devoted English missionary, tells us that 
"the actual increase of the population is much 
more than the 200,000,000;" and ''we rejoice in 
the work accomplished by modern Christian mis- 
sions, wliile we mourn over tlie sad fact, tliat the 
increase of tlie heathen is numerically more than 
f^tventij t'nnes greater than that of the converts 



THE ONLY HOPE. 



Ill 



during the century of missions." ^^J, worse 
still; ^' the great heathen and Mohammedan systems 
of religion are not only increasing their adlierents 
by the ordinary birth-rate, but are yearly making 
far more converts than our Christian missions." 
In the third place the outlook at home is not 
much more encouraging. The bright-eyed opti- 
mists boast that there are 12,000,000 of Protestant 
church members. Granted ; but there are 50,000,- 
000 more souls to be converted than when the 
Constitution of the United States was adopted. 
Their figures perplex a plain man who is not good 
in mathematics, when he knows upon undoubted 
authority that not one in ten, at least of our city 
people, can be induced to listen to the preaching 
of the gospel. In ^ew York City, for example, 
with its 1,500,000 inhabitants, but 85,000 were 
found on a fair day in its various places of worship; 
and if every seat in every church, chapel, hall and 
other preaching station was occupied every Sunday, 
there Avould still be 1,250,000 persons who could 
not hear tlie gospel if tliey so desired. An item 
whicli has just appeared in a sunny New York 
religious paper tells the story. It is as follows: 
" Churches and population below Fourteenth street: 
1850, 36 churches, 400,000 population; 1890, 24 
churches, (300,000 population." London with a 
population of 6,000,000, the most thoroughly 
evangelized city of tlie world, with the ablest 
i)reachers and tlie lart/est charities, furnishes church 
accommodations for only 1,500,000; and very few 
of its houses of worship are half filled. Let any 
one read Gen. Booth's '^ Li Darkest Enoland," and 
see what is the dreadful condition of thincrft in the 



112 



TILL HE COME. 



heart of Christendom. A similar proportion of 
the neglected and of non-church goers is found in 
all of our principal cities. 

In the fourth place, our leading professors in 
college and theological seminary, at least the pro- 
fessors who have the ear of the public and are 
most admired and applauded, seem to he deter- 
mined to destroy the foundation of faith in the 
authority and certainty of God's word. A power- 
fully written article which recently appeared in a 
Chicago secular newspaper, well presents the case: 

The sum of all is that the Bible is " a fallible book," con- 
sisting of "idyls, myths, poems, fiction, dreams, predictions, 
histories,novels,morals and theology," full of "human inven- 
tions and impefections," with traces of the divine in it, but, 
of itself, "'no absolute criterion of faith, morals or wor- 
ship." The impertinent assault (f Dr. Schaff, Professor 

Briggs' colleague, upon the Westminster Confession, sent a 

shock through all the ch.irches two years ago And, more 

recently, the so-called "American Institute of Sacred Liter- 
ature," with Professors Briggs and Harper in the lead, teach- 
ing that the authority of' Jesus Christ and His apostles 
amounts to nothing in questions of " higher criticism," since 
they did not profess to bs' critics, and had another mission — 
and teaching this in Chicago and Boston under the auspices 
of the Young IVlen's Christian Association^ — has given inten- 
sity to the situation This is not a Presbyterian, or a Bap- 
tist, or a Congregational fight. It is an open apostasy in the 
bosom of professing Christendom, Not one solitary Assem- 
bly or Association or Conference has taken action on the 
subject. The poison is deep in the veins of the denomina- 
tions. An eminent Professor in Berlin, another in Neu- 
chatel, another in Vienna, and another in Dorpat have 
recently written that "nothing now can stay the tide of defec- 
tion froja the faith which is rising in the bosom of Christen- 
dom," and "the church can only expect the divine judgments 
her sins have provoked." " A higher critic, enthroned above 
all earthly critics, will avenge the wrongs done to His own 
AVord and to Himself." 

The sudden outburst of infidelity among able, 

and learned, and eloquent and inthiential Profes- 



Till-: ONLY IIOTK. 118 

sors, who are connected with scliools for the train- 
ing of yonng men, soon to become pastors, is one 
of tlie most sio;nilicant sio^ns of the times. T>esi(les 
Professor Briggs and Professor Harper v/ith their 
destructive " Higher Criticism,'' l)orrowed of 
conrse from the Germans, we liave Professor Schnr- 
man in the Cono-recyational clmrcli, Professor Allen 
in the Episcopal, Professor Workman in the Meth- 
odist, publishing statements about the Bible that 
miorht make Mr. Ingersoll blush. On the other 
side of the Atlantic we have Professor Dods, IVofes- 
sor Drummond, Professor Smyth, Professor David- 
son assailing the inspiration of God's word, deny- 
ing the fall of man, the atonement of Christ, and 
every essential truth. Professor Momerie of the 
theological department in King's College is just 
out in a book in which he tells us that the inspira- 
tion of the Scripture does not differ in quality 
from that of Shakespeare or Newton. 

Let the following suffice to show liis teachings 
that are gladly accepted by many theological Pro- 
fessors of our day: 

Between the covers of this little volume (the Bible) we 
find opinions as diverse and contradictory as have ever existed 
in the world. And in particular we can trace it in the devel- 
opment of the idea of God from barbarism up to Hegel 

The modern priest talks about miracles — Gadarene pigs, and 
whatnot — as he might have done at a. time when natural 
laws had never been heard of, when every one believed, not 
in the uniformity, but in the irregularity of Nature. . . .He 
speaks about inspiration and revelation, as if he did not know 
that much of the teacliing of the Bible had been equaled, 
and even surpassed, in other sacred literatures, and that some 
of the sayings of Christ Himself — including even the golden 
rule — had been anticipated by ''pagans" liundreds of ^^'ars 

before the Christian era There is a jn-actically inlinite 

difference between the God of the patriarchs, avIio is always 
repenting, and the God of-the apostles It is strangle tlut 



114 TILL HE COME. 



persons who have read the 25th chapter of Matthew should 
still believe. in the doctrine of Justification by Faith. 

Tlie Rev. Minot J. Savage 13. D., a Unitarian 
preacher of Boston, no doubt tells the truth in a 
recently published discourse, when he says, " There 
are any number of places in America where there 
w^ould be Unitarian churches within three months, 
were it not for the fact that the nominally orthodox 
ministers of those places have taken the wind com- 
pletely out of the Unitarian sails. The people say, 
'What is the use of a Unitarian Church? Our 
minister is as broad as your's ; he no longer preaches 
an infallible Bible, or hell, or the Trinity.'" He 
is ]io doubt truthful also in the statement that a 
prominent minister, orthodox in name, declared to 
him he did not know one preacher in his large 
circle of acquaintance whc now believes these doc- 
trines. Can any one fail to see that there has been 
a departure from the Bible, as Avide as intidelity, 
by numbers Avho give instruction from the pulpit? 

In the lifth place, the pew is in a still more 
deplorable condition, if this were possible. The 
atmosphere is laden with the malaria of skepticism, 
as it is said to be charged with the microbes of 
deadly disease, and the members of the church 
inhale it, like others. The germs of unbelief cling 
to nearly all of our current literature, being found 
not only in the works of scientists, who are almost 
to man asseverating acrnostics or avowed atheists, 
but also in magazines, newspapers, good-for-noth- 
ing novels, and even in volumes of popular ser- 
mons. The British Weel'hj, which is any thing 
but a pessimistic periodical, declares it to be '^a 
fact that the vast majority of the younger nu^n. 



THE ONLY HOPE. 115 



who are providino; the best journalism of tlie day, 
are unbelievers. They do not even accept the 
idea of a GOD/' 

It is not surprising, therefore, that professing 
christians who read much are carried away from 
the truth. It is one of the many evidences of the 
supernatural origin of the Scriptures that they 
come into sharp conflict with human nature, and 
if human natui'e is given a chance, even the human 
nature of a professing Christian, it will take sides 
every time against God and His word. This is 
the secret of the excessive popularity of such relig- 
ious writers as Professor Drummond. " He adapts 
Christianity to its present environment," as one of 
his admirers has said, and throws down the reins 
upon tlie neck of man's natural desires and self- 
sufticiency. The educational process of substi- 
tuting human opinion for the authority of the 
inspired writings has gone to such extent, that a 
vast majority of those who have confessed the 
name of Christ are almost as ignorant of the Bible, 
as if no such book had been written. They prefer 
to travel on His day for business or pleasure, or if 
they stay at home, their minds are stuffed with the 
crime and gossip, the scandal and politics of the 
Sunday newspaper before they observe the empty 
form of public worship. The most startling thing 
about it is the utter deadness of conscience to any 
claim of God. Numbers of them are living in 
open and notorious sin, and yet their names are 
enrolled on the church registers, and they come to 
the Lord's table under the fatal delusion that they 
are Christians. Scarcely a day passes without the 
mention in the newpapers or the names even of 



116 



TILL HE COME. 



ministers of the gospel in connection with licen- 
tiousness; and so numerous are defaulters and 
thieves who are Sunday School teachers and church 
officers, they have ceased to excite surprise 

Even among the others who maintain a decent out- 
ward deportment, how few manifest any real spiritual 
life! Wliat a mere handful of any considerable 
congregation in the land can be found in the 
prayer-meeting, or Sunday-school, or kneeling in 
family worship, or speaking a Avord for Christ, so 
far as can be ascertained! The most of those who 
appear before the world as tlie representatives of 
the Lord Jesus, attend the theatre, or send their 
children to the dancing school, or whirl in the 
lustful waltz, or carry on gambling in their own 
houses under the name of progressive euchre, or 
they are tricky in trade, or covetous and stingy, or 
mean and untruthful, ungodly in their amuse- 
ments, conversation, fashions, habits, maxims, 
principles, purposes, and reading, no one being 
able to discover the faintest line of separation 
between them and the world. Dear Dr. Bonor 
truly said, "I look for the church, and find 
it in the world ; I look for the world, and find 
it in the church." A few years ago a somewhat 
notorious Catholico-Episcopal or Episcopo-*Cfttholic 
clergyman of New York city caused quite a 
hubbub by declaring that Protestantism is a fail- 
ure. But if judged by the standard of doctrine 
and duty revealed in the New Testament, the man 
was right. Or, if it is expected to convert the 
world, he was right. In this respect both Protest- 
antism and Popery are wretched failures. The 
world has converted them. 



THE ONLY HOPE. 117 

111 the t^ixtli place, society is leprous all o\ei\ 

Upon this siil)ject it is enough perhaps, to quote 

Elizaheth Stuart Phelps, one of the purest and 

most popular of our writers: 

A promineut literary mau, himself used to the world and 
the ways thereof, urged earnestly upon the author 1he publi- 
cation of this paper, saying, " In my humble opinion, the 
ideal of propriety held by what is called society, has abso- 
lutely no relation to the moral sense. To take a point; when 
I seethe ease, nay, the eagerness with which our young girls 
attend and seem to prefer those plays where the ballet is 
enough to make any gentleman unc(mifortable, I am con- 
fused. AVhat does it mean?" Our stage exhibits moral 

monstrosity to the edge of abomination,. . . .while the fathers 
of our girl's pay two dollars and a half a seat for the privilege 
of exposing their daughters to sights which ought to be sup- 
jiressed under the law prohibiting the exhibition of obscene 
pictures. 

Of course her noble indignation will be sneered 
at as prudery, as her denounciations of the dance 
will be; and the young girls will continue to swarm 
to the obscene exhibitions of the theatre, and to be 
clasped in the embrace of men. 

Any fashion which gives to a roue the right to clasp a 
pure woman in his arms, and hold her for the length of an 
intoxicating piece of music, is below moral defense. I 
lirmly believe that the time will come when our present li- 
cense in this respect will be regarded as we now regard the 
practices attending the worship of Aphrodite. It might be 
said that nautch dance [a dance performed by prostitutes] 

is modesty beside our waltz One need not be a fanatic in 

the temperance movement to discern one cause for the de- 
crease of modesty in the increase of drinking habits among 
a certain class of our ladies. " Certainly," testifies the first 
young man I happen to ask, himself a person of so-called 
good morals; "certainly I have often danced with young 
ladies who were intoxicated. It is not an uncommon thing 
to meet them • too far gone ' to converse." If the deliacy of a 
sober girl cannot protect her from the taint in the social at- 
mosphere, what is to be expected from the modesty of a 
drunken one? In the old times a modest wife hardly con- 
versed ^^ith her own husband as young women do to-day 



118 TILL HE COME. 



Avitli yoimg men of their acquaintance .... It is a fact, gloss 
it an}' flow as we may, that decent women have never dressed 
so indecenth'' in our country and centur}^ as they do in fash- 
ionable life to-day. 

Perhaps it is well to add the opening of last 
New Year's address by Dr. Tahnage, the most 
popular preaclier in America, and tlie most hope- 
ful optimist, who always looks on the " bright side," 
and who calls npon the cliurch for a forward 
movement. 

That there is need for such a religious movement is evi- 
dent from the fact that never since our world was swung out 
among the planets has there been such an organized and de- 
termined effort to overthrow righteousness, and make the 
ten commandments obsolete and the whole Bible a derision. 
Meanwhile alcoholism is taking down its victims by the 
hundreds of thousands, and the political parties get down on 
their knees practically saying, " O thou Rum Jug, we bow 
down before thee. Give us the offices, city, state and national. 
(Jh, give us the offices and we will worship thee forever and 
ever, Amen." The Christian Sabbath, meanwhile, appointed 
for physical, mental and spiritual rest, is being secularized 
and abolished. As if the bad publishing houses of our own 
country had exhaisted their literary filth, the French and 
Russian sewers have been invited to pour their scurrility and 
moral slush into the trough, where our American swine are 
now wallowing. Meanwhile, there are enough marts of im- 
famy in all our city, open and unmolested of the law, to in- 
voke the Omnipotent wrath, which buried Sodom under a 
deluge of brimstone. The pandemoniac world, I think, has 
massed its troops, and they are this moment playing their 
batteries upon family circles, church circles, social circles 
and national circles. Apollyon is in the saddle and, riding 
at the head of his myrmidons, would capture this world for 
darkness and woe. 

In the seventh place, neither the government 
of the United States nor of any other nation in 
Christendom, posssesses the elements of stability. 
The vile immoralities of men in public life, both 
in Great Britain and in America, to say nothing of 
the determined and desperate socialism pervading 
the working classes, and the rapid increase of 



THE (^M.Y HOPE. 119 



crime and (Irunkeiiuef^s and licentiousness and vice 
in every form are snreh^ rotting away the founda- 
tions on wliicli alone empires and republics stand. 
A friend, wlio lias carefully looked over the col 
umns of a daily city newspaper for a single month 
of the year 1891, reports that he read accounts of 
404 murders and 586 other crimes, such as adul- 
tery, burglary, robbery and rape, some of which 
wei'e worse than brutal, for they were devilish. 
Add to this the statisiics brought out in a paper 
read befoie the Young Men's Christian Association 
Convention of Illinois, in 1890, telling us " that 
we have about 7,000,000 of young men between 
eighteen and thirty, and that 6,000,000 of these 
never attend a church; that only about 350,000 are 
members of any churcli; while there aie over 
700,000 young men between those ages in our 
public prisons at some time during each year." 
In this country for the past fifteen years the most 
earnest and persistent efforts have been made by 
good men, and by organized bands of women, to 
put an end to the drink traffic, and to arrest the 
fi'ightful evils of intemperance. How far these 
efforts have succeeded may be learned from the 
following table just received directly from the 
Revenue Office in Washington City. Under the 
head, '' Distilled Spirits Consumed," it appears 
that in 1875 there were 66,120,588 gallons used; 
in 1890, 87,829,562 gallons. Under the head, 
'• Wine Consumed," in 1875 there were 19,991,330 
gallons; in 1889, these had increased to 34,144,477 
gallons. Under the head, "Malt Liquors Con- 
sumed," the people in 1875 drank 294,953,157 
gallons; and in 1890 they swallowed 856,792,335 



120 TILL HE CO^rE. 



gallons. When we add to tliese figures the appall- 
ing fact that there is an annual expenditure in 
this so-called (liristion land of $900,000,000 for 
liquor, and 1600,000,000 for tobacco, while the 
paltry sum of |5, 500,000 is given to Home and 
Foreign Missions, it is evident that the millen- 
nium has not yet dawned, but it is growing darker 
every day. 

Senator Ingalls, of Kansas, perhaps the keenest 
intellect in the United States Senate, whatever 
may be thought of him as a man or politician, 
recently delivered before the Senate a carefully 
prepared oration, which open as follows: 

Mr. President, two portentous perils threaten the safety, 
if they do not e, danger, the existence of the republic. The 
Jirst of these is ignorant, debased, degraded, spurious, and 
sophisticated suffrage, contaminated by the sewage of decay- 
ing nations; suffrage intimidated and suppressed in the 
South; suffrage impure and corrupt, apathetic and indiffer- 
ent, in the great cities of the North; so that it is doubtful 
whether there has been for half a century a presidential elec- 
tion in this country that expressed the deliberate and intelli- 
gent judgment of the whole body of the American people. . 
The second evil Mr. President, to which I adverted as threat- 
ening the safety, if it does not endanger the existence, of the 
republic, is the tyranny of combined, concentrated, centra- 
lized, and incorporated capital. [He then shows that of the 
enormous wealth of the country, $(35,000,000,000, considerably 
more than one-half is in the hands of 31,100 persons.] Mr. 
President, it is the most appalling statement that ever fell 
upon mortal ears. It is, so far as the results of democracy 
as a social and political experiment are C(mcerned the most 
terrible commentary that ever was recorded in the book of 
time — and Nero fiddles whi e Rome burns. It is thrown off 
with a laugh and a sneer, "as the froth upon the beer" of our 
])()litical and social system. . . .Nor is this all, ]\Ir. President; 
tlie hostility between the employers and the employed in this 
country is becoming vindictive and permanently malevolent. 
Labor and capitol are in two hostile camps to-day. Lock- 
outs and strikes and libor difficulties have become practic- 
ally the normal condition of our system, and it is estimated 
that during the year that has just closed, in conseriuence of 



THE ONLY TIOTK 



121 



these disorders, in consequence of this hostility and this war- 
fare, the actual loss to the country has not been less than 
$300,000,000. 

The saddest feature a1)oiit it all is the fact that 
the laboring men, or wage-workei's, or bread- 
winners, as they are foolishly called, hate the 
cliiirch Avitli the bitterest hatred. They regard it 
as part of the fashionable and wealthy society 
which, they complain, deprives them of their 
rights. Upon this laige and important class of the 
commnnity the Protestant church, at least, has 
almost entirely lost its hold. Not one in ten 
thousand of them ever goes near a building in 
which religions services are observed, and it must 
be confessed, that the appearance of the congrega- 
tion, and the intellectual preaching, on the inside 
are not calculated to draw them. When we find 
our great scientific authorities announcing that 
there is no God, and our leading professors declar- 
ing that the Bible is not true, and our most popu- 
lar preachers proclaiming that there is no future 
punishment, even one who is not the son of a 
prophet can safely predict that the sources of mor- 
ality Avill soon be dried, and the barriers to uni- 
versal lawlessness speedily removed. No wonder 
tliat at the close of the present age the vial of 
divine wrath is poured out upon the sea; "and it 
became as the blood of a dead man." Hev. xvi:3. 

Only a glance has been given to some of the 
difficulties and evils that lie upon the very surface 
of things. Yery much more could have been 
truthfully written under each of the topics here 
presented; but perhaps enough has been said to 
convince any fair-minded reader of the utter fail- 
ure of man under the best circumstances. It is 



122 TILL HE COME. 



distasteful, however, to' most persons to face 
unpleasant facts, and hence the actual facts, now 
presented in the mildest manner, will be scouted, 
just as the few who predicted the late civil war, 
arguing from the inevitable logic of cui-rcnt events 
and from the una\'oidable relation of cause to 
effect, were ridiculed as cranks and pessimists. So 
the mass of the people and the preachers will con- 
tinue to laugh, claiming that the church has never 
been in so flourishing a condition, declaring that 
the world is l)ecoming l)etter every day, until the 
storm of God's wrath shall burst upon them, as 
the rain of fire and brimstone swept the cities of 
the plain. 

There is an absolute necessity for the personal 
coming of the Lord Jesus Christ to save an apos- 
tate church and a godless, undone world. Never 
has any former age terminated in more complete 
disaster and ruin tlian that which confronts the 
professing Christian body in the dispensation of 
the Spirit. Nay, in proportion to the height of 
privilege to which the gospel has exalted those who 
have heard its glad tidings, will be the depth of 
their fall; and the ruin of the house, built not upon 
the impregnable rock of Scripture but upon the 
sand, shall be great. Even at the end 'of the 
millennial period, the seventh dispensation, there 
will be a final attempt of the liberated Satan and 
the confederated nations to destroy the authority 
of Jehovah. It will be amply demonstrated to 
angels and men and demons that, however culti- 
vated and wherever placed, ^' the mind of the flesh 
is enmity against God.'' Rom. viii:7. 



THE ONI.V HOTK. 

The day of the Lord it coiiieth, 

It eometh like a thief in ihe night, 
It comes when the workl is dreaming 

Of safety and of peace and light; 
It Cometh, the day of sackcloth, 

With darkness, and storm, and tire, 
The day of the Great Avenger, 

The day of the burning ire. 

The day of the Lord it eometh, 
When tlie virgins are all asleep, 

And the drunken world is lying- 
in a slumber yet more deep; 

Like a sudden lurch of the vessel, 
By night on the sunken rock. 

All earth in a moment reeleth. 
And goeth down with the shock. 

The flash of the sword of havoc 

Foretelleth the day of blood, 
Revealing the Judge's progress. 

The downward march of God; 
The fire which no mortal kindles, 

Quick seizes the (piaking earth, 
And labors the groaning creation 

In the pangs of its second birth. 

Then the day of the evil endeth. 

And the righteous reign comes in, 
Like a cloud of sorrow evanish. 

The ages of human sin; 
The light of the morning gleameth 

Adown, without cloud or gloom. 
In chains lies the ruler of darkness, 

And the Prince of Liuht has come! 



128 



124 TILL II K COME. 



CHAPTER XII. 



A PRACTICAL HOPE. 



BEYOXD question tlie doctrine of onr Lord's 
second coining is the comanding motive of 
the New Testament. Not even the love of 
Christ is so frequently mentioned as an incentive. 
It is connected by the Holy Ghost with every 
doctrine and duty, with every precept and practice 
of Christain faith and conduct. It arms admoni- 
tions, it points appeals, it strengthens arguments, 
it enforces commands, it intensifies entreaties, it 
arouses courage, it rebukes fear, it quickens affec- 
tion, it kindles hope, it inflames zeal, it separates 
from the world, it consecrates to God, it dries tears, 
it conquers death. 'No one will deny that it is 
found everywhere through gospels and epistles, al- 
though many will aflirm that the passages contain- 
ing it do not mean what they declare. 

A dear old ex-pastor of Brooklyn,celebrated for 
the number of his charmiiio; contributions to re- 
ligious periodicals, and still more noted for his 
enormous egotism, has recently informed the pub- 
lic that one hundred printed texts on tlie second 
advent have no more to do with the coming of the 
Lord than witli the McKinley tariff bilk This 
shows, not only the density of the dear old Doctors 
ignorance, but the weakness of the silly subterfuge 
by which some of the beloved post-millennial 
l>ivthren seek to evade the truth concei'iiing oui* 
Saviour's personal return. Every one of the one 



A I'JBACTICAL HOPE. 125 

huiidrel texts touches directly upon that personal 
return, as do the texts now presented in the form 
of a Second Advent Alphabet, and these by no 
means exhaust the subject. 

ABIDING in Christ. ''And now, little cliil- 
(hen, abide in llim; that when lie shall appear, 
we may have contidence, and not be ashamed be- 
foi'e Ilim at His coming." 1 Jno. ii:28. 

BROTHERLY LOVE. -The Lord make you 
to increase and abound in love one toward another, 
and toAvard all men, even as Ave do toward you; to 
the end He may establish your hearts unblamable 
in holiness before God, even our Father, at the 
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ Avith all His 
saints." 1 Thess, ii:12, 13. 

CONSOLATION. "I Avould not have you to 
be ignorant, brethren, concerning them Avhich are 
asleep, that ye sorroAv not, even as others Avhich 
ha\^e no hope. For if Ave belie A^e that Jesus died 
and rose again, even so them also which sleep in 
Jesus Avill (lod bring Avith Him." 1 Thess. iv:13, 14. 

DEADNESS TO SIN. - When Christ, Avho is 
our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear 
Avitli Him in glory. Mortify therefore your mem- 
bers Avhicli are upon the earth." Col. iii:4, 5. 

ENDURANCE. "B^liold, I come quickly: 
hold that fast Avhich thou hast, that no man take 
thy croAvn." Rev. iiiill. " WhosoeA^r, there- 
fore, shall be ashamed of me and of my Avords in 
this adulterous and sinful creneration, of him, shall 
the Son of man be ashamed, Avlien He cometh in 
the glory of His father Avith the holy angels." 
Mark viii:38. 

FAITHFULNESS. "■ A certain nobleman went 



126 TILL HE COME. 



into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom, 
and to return. And he called his ten servants,and 
delivered them ten pounds, and said unto them, 
Occupy until I come.'' Lu. xix:12, 13. 

GODLINESS. " The day of the Lord will come 
as a thief in the niglit .... Seeing then tliat all 
these things shall he dissolved, what manner of 
persons ought ye to he in all holy conversation and 
godliness, looking for and hasting the coming of 
the day of God!" 2 Pet. iii:10, 12. 

HEAYENLY-MINDEDNESS. " Our citizen- 
ship is in heaven ; from whence also we look for 
the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ." Phil. iii:20. 
'' Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it doth 
not yet appear what Ave shall he; hut we know that 
when Pie shall appear, we shall he like him, for we 
shall see Llim as He is. And every man that hath 
this hope in Him purifieth himself, even as He is 
pure." 1 Jno. iii:2, 3. 

INSTATANEOUS. "As the lightning come^h 
out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; 
so also shall the coming of the Son of Man he." 
Matt. xxiv:27. 

JUDGMENT. "Behold, the Lord cometh 
with ten thousands of His saints, to execute judg- 
ment upon all." Jude 14. '^AVlien the Son of 
Man shall come in His glory, and all the holy 
angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the 
throne of His glory, and hefore Him shall be gath- 
ered all nations." Matt. xxv:31, 22. 

KEEPING THE GARMENTS. "Behold, I 
come as a thief. Blessed is lie that wateheth, and 
keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they 
see his shame," Ilev. xvi:15. 



A PRACTICAL HOPE. 127 

LORD'S SUPPER. -As oft as ye eat this 
bread, and drink this cup, ye do shew the Lord's 
death till He come." 1 Cor. xi:26. '• If I go and 
prepare a place for yon, I will come again, and 
receive yon nnto myself." Jno. xiv:3. " Unto 
them that look for llini shall He appear a second 
time, withont sin nnto salvation." Heb. ix:28. 
* MODERATION. " Let yonr moderation be 
known unto all men. The Lord is at hand." Phil. 
iv:5, " Therefore judge nothing before the time, 
nntil the Lord come." 1 Cor. iv:5. 

NEARNESS. " Yet a little Avhile and He that 
shall come will come, and will not ta-ry." Heb. 
x:38. - Stablisli yonr hearts: for the coming of 
the Lord draweth nigh." Jas. v:8. 

OBEDIENCE. - The Lord Jesns shall be re- 
vealed from heaven with His mighty angels, in 
liaming lire, taking vengeance on them that knoAv 
not God, and that obey not tlie gospel of our Lord 
Jesns Christ." 2 Thess. i:7,8. 

PATIENCE. " Be patient, therefore, brethren 
unto the coming of the Lord." Jas. v:7. "The 
Lord direct your hearts into the love of God, and 
into thepaitent waiting for Christ." 2 Thess. iii:5. 

QUICKLY. " Behold, I come quickly." Rev. 
xxii:7. " He which testifieth these things saith, 
surely I come quickly; Amen. Even so, come. 
Lord Jesus." Rev. xxii:20. 

REAVARD. "The Son of Man shall come in the 
glory of His Father with His angels; and then He 
shall reward every man according to liis works." 
Matt. xvi:27« "Behold, I come quickly; and my 
j-eward is witli me, to give every man as his work 
shall be," Rev. xxii:12. 



128 



TILL HE COME. 



SANTIFICATIO]N\ "The God of peace Him- 
self sanctify you wliolly; and may yonr spirit and 
soul and body be perserved entire, without blame, 
at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Thess. 
v:23, R Y. 

TRIALS. -That the trial of your faith, being 
much more precious than of gold that perisheth, 
though it be tried with lire, might be found unto 
praise and honor and glory at the appearing of 
Jesus Christ." 1 Pet. 1:7. 

UlS'EEBUKABLE. - I give thee charge in the 
sight of God, who quickeneth all things, and of 
Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed 
a good confession ; that thou keep this command- 
ment without spot, unrebukable, until the appear- 
ing of our Lord Jesus Christ." I Tim. vi:13, 14. 

VIGILANCE. "Let your loins be girded 
about, and your lights burning; and ye yourselves 
like unto men that wait for the Lord," Lu. xii:35. 
" Watch ye therefore; for ye know not when the 
Master of the liouse cometh, at even, or at mid- 
night, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning: 
lest coming suddenly He iind you sleeping. Ana 
what I say unto you I say unto all, AVatch." Mark 
xiii:35, 37. 

WAITING. " Ye turned to God from idols, to 
serve the living and true God, and to wait for His 
Son from Heaven, whom He raised from tlie dead, 
Jesus who delivered us from tlie wratli to come." 
1 Thess. i:9, 10. " Ye come beliind in no gift; 
waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." 
1 Cor. 1:7. 

'XC^ELLENT. "That ye may approve things 
that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and 



A PRKCTICAL IlOl'K. 129 

without offence until the day of Christ." Phil. 
1:9, 10. 

YEARN IXG. " Looking for \j)-ros(hJio?nai^ ex- 
pecting, waiting for] that blessed hope, and ap- 
pearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour 
Jesus Christ.'' Tit. ii:13. '^ Even we ourselves 
groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, 
the redemption of our body." Ivoni. viii:23. 
"Christ the iirst-fruits; afterward they that are 
Christ's at His coming." 1 Cor. xv:23. 

ZEAL. " I have fought a good tight, I have 
finished my course, I have kept the faith; hence- 
forth there is laid up forme a crown of righteous- 
ness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will 
give me at that day; and not to me only, but unto 
ail them also that love His appearing." 2 Tim. 
iv:7, 8. "Blessed are those servants whom the 
Lord, when He cometh, shall iind watching." Lu. 
xii:37. "That which ye have already, hold fast 
till I come." Rev. ii:25. "Behold I come quickly; 
hold that fast Avhich thou hast, that no man take 
tliy crown." Rev. iii:2. 

Any one can easily see that if the doctrine is prac- 
tically received, it must become a practical power 
in the life. For example, the pre-millennialist 
reads the words of his Lord, " This gospel of the 
kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a 
witness unto all nations ; and then shall the end 
come;" and animated by the hope of hastening the 
end, and the coming of tlie King, and tlie over- 
tlirow of tlie " world rulers of this darkness," he 
joyfully embarks in foreign missionary enterprises. 
Scores and hundreds of faithful ambassadors for 
Christ in heathen lands testify that they caught a 



130 TILL HE COME. 



mighty and abiding impulse to labor on, in the 
face of sore discouragements, when they embraced 
the hope of His coming as their governing principle. 
J. Hudson Taylor, at the head of the China In- 
land Mission, and his more than 300 devoted mis- 
sionaries, are all earnest pre-millennialists. Dr. H. 
Grattan Guinness, founder of the Congo Mission, 
who annually sends a number of hispre-millennial 
students to the heathen Avorld, is an earnest pre- 
millennialist. Kev John Wilkinson, with singu- 
lar self-denial conducting missions among the Jews 
of Europe, and all his assistants, are earnest pre mil- 
lenialists. Ileo;inald Had cliff e, Esq., travelling for 
years from place to place in the interests of foreign 
missions, is an earnest pre-millennialist. George 
MuUer, a missionary nearly ninety years of age, 
and supporting anumberof pre-millennial mission- 
aries, is an earnest pre-millennialist. Dr. A. T. 
Pierson, editor of the best missionary revicAv ever 
printed, who has done more than any other man 
in American to arouse the churches from their 
guilty indiiference to the perishing millions of 
earth, is an earnest pre-millennialist. Dr. A. J. 
Gordon, at the head of the training school for for- 
eign missions among the Baptists, is an earnest 
pre-millennialst. W. E. Blackstone, Esq., at the 
head of a training school for foreign missions 
among the Methodists, is an earnest pre-millen- 
nialist. Rev. I. C. Scofield, at the head of a train- 
ing school for foreign missions among tlie Con- 
g;i'egationalists, is an earnest pre-millennialist. 
The young men and Avomen who went from Kan- 
sas to tlie Soudan, glad to lay down their lives for 
Jesus, were all earnest pre-millennialists; so easy 



A PRACTICAL HOPE. 



181 



is it to cut the nerve of the stale slander that faitli 
in the pre-millennial coming of the Lord cuts the 
nerve of missionary effort, 

In Christian lands, as they are called, Christian 
in profession and heathen in practice, the same 
stimulatincr effect of the truth is seen in the lives 
of Evangelists all of whom in Great Britian, pei*- 
liaps witliout exception, and all of wlioni in the 
United States, with only one exception that is 
known, are earnest pre-millennialists. The secret 
of their untiring activity and fervor was happily ex- 
pressed hy poor Henry Ward Beecher, Avhen he 
described them as men engaged in saving as many 
as possible from a wrecked and sinking ship. 
They believe that "the time is short," 1 Cor. vii: 
29, or as the Greek word implies, that the time for 
furling in sail has come; and they are anxious to 
take with them as many as tliey can lay hands 
upon into the harbor of eternal rest. 

To the believer engaged in ordinary occupations, 
the hope of the Lord's return comes as a divine 
power to separate him from tlie world. He is like 
a young Christian, who, after his conversion to 
the pre-millennial faith, was asked by a friend to 
accompany him to a theatre. "]Xo," was the reply; 
" the Lord may come to-night, and I do not wish 
him to find me in a place where He Himself would 
not be welcome." It is impossible for a man who 
is walking in tlie golden beams of that liope to 
live like the ungodly around him. He knows that 
he is a stranger and pilgrim amid these vanishing 
scenes, and he is careful not to fasten his tent pins 
too deep in the eartli. His aims and aspirations, 
his purposes and pursuits,his tastes and tendencies 



132 TILL HE COME. 



are all different from tlie ambitions, and customs, 
and objects of the social and political circles^ 
tlirough which he moves as a citizen of another 
country. Dr. David Brown bears the following 
true testimony to the premillennial doctrine: 

It is a school of scripture interpretation: It impinges 
upon and effects some of the most commanding points of 
the Christian faith; and, when suffered to work its unimped- 
ed way, it stops not till it has prevaded with its own genius 
the entire system of one's theology, and the whole tone of 
his spiritual character, constructing, I had almost said, a 
world of its own; so that, holding the same faith, and cherish- 
ing the same fundamental hopes as other Christians, he yet 
sees things through a medium of his own, and finds every- 
thing instinct with the life which this doctrine has generated 
within him. 

Especially do these remarks apply to the view 
which the pre-millennialist takes of death. He 
hopes that he will not die at all, for he knows that 
"we shall not all sleep," 1 Cor. xv:51; he would not 
be '^ unclothed, but clothed upon that mortality 
might be swallowed up of life," 2 Cor. v:4; andlie 
desires to be among those of whom it is written, 
" we which are alive and remain, shall be caught 
up together with them in the clouds, to meet the 
Lord in the air." 1 Tliess. iv:17. Hence, he is 
amazed to hear Christians say that the coming of 
the lord and death are one and the same, or that 
there is no difference between them, l^o differ- 
ence! One is all gladness, and the other is all 
sadness. One is all glory and the other is all 
gloom. One is all morning and the other is all 
mid-night. Out upon the base suggestion! It 
makes one indignant to hear that any dare put the 
hateful and loathsome monster death, that with 
rnffianly violence has torn away our darlings, that 
with black wing, as of a cyclone, has darkened our 



A PRACTrCAL HOPE. 183 

homes, in the place of the sweet and most precious 
coming of our Lord, which will prevent death. 
The pre-millennialist reads with joy that death is 
to be cast into the hike of fire at tlie judgment of 
the great white Throne. Kev. xx:14. 

" Waiting we standi 

And watching till our Saviour shal? appear, 

Joyful to cry, as eastern skies grow clear, 

'The Lord's at hand!' 

But now the night 
Presses around us, sullenly and chill; 
Pain, doubt, and sorrow seem to have their will: 
Lord, send the light! 

One after one. 
Thou hast called up our loved ones from our sight; 
For them we know that there is no more night 
But we are a lone. 

Weary we wait. 
Lifting our heavy eyes, bedimmed with tears. 
To skies where yet no trace of dawn appears: — 
Lord, it is late ! 

But yet thy word 
Sait]i,with sweet prophecy that cannot fail. 
That light o'er darkness shall at length prevail: — 
We trust thee Lord! 

O Morning Star 
Of heavenly promise! light our darkened way, 
Till the first beams of the expected day 

Shine from afar. 

So will we take 

Fresh hope and courage to our fainting hearts, 

And patient wait, though every joy departs, 

' Till the day break.' " 



134 



TILL HE COMK. 



CHAPTER XIII. 



WITNESSES TO THE HOPE. 



IT IS needless, perhaps, to affirm that the early 
Christians were pre-niillennialists. That is, 
they looked for the speedy personal return of the 
Lord Jesus, and did not dream of a spirtual mil- 
lennium, or the conversion of the world by the 
church. This is freely admitted by Dr. Charles. 
Hodge, Mr. Albert Barnes, Prof. Hackett and all 
other post-millennial expositors without exception, 
so far as known. All no doubt would heartily 
agree with the remarks of Mr. Barnes on the words 
to wait for His Son from Heaven. 1 Thess. i:10. 

It is clear from this and from other parts of these two 
epistles, that the return of the Lord Jesus to this world was 
a prominent subject of the preaching of Paul at Thessalonica. 
In the passage before us, he saj^s that the return of the Son 
of God from heaven was an important point which had been 
insisted on when he was there; and that their conduct, as 
borne witness to by all, had shown with what power it had 
seized upon them, and what a practical influence it had 

exerted in their lives It is eminently adapted to comfort 

the hearts of true Christians in the sorrows, bereavements, 
and sicknesses of life (John xiv:l-3; Acts i:ll; 1 Thess-. iv:13- 
18; 2 Pet. iii:8, 9); to lead us to watchfulness and to an 
earnest inquiry into the question whether we are prepared 
to meetHim(Matt. xxiv:37-44; xxv:13); to make us dead to the 
world, and to lead us to act as becomes the children of light 
(I Thess. v:5-9); to awaken and arouse impenitent and care- 
less sinners (i Thess. v:2-3; 2 Pet. iii:3-7), and to excite 
Cliristians to self-denying efforts to spread the gospel in 
distant lands, as w^as the case at Thessalonica. Every doc- 
trine of the gospel is adapted to produce some happy practi- 
cal effects in mankind, but there are few that are more full of 
elevated and holy influences than that which teaches that the 



WITNESSES TO THE tlOPE. 



135 



Lord Jesus will retiiru to the earth, and which leads the 
soul to wait for his appearing. 

If the objection is raised tliat Mr. Barnes, and 
the otlier commentators named, were tliemselves 
post-millennialists, the answer is at hand. Tlie 
testimony of an nnwilling witness is always and 
properly considered more conclusive than the testi- 
mony of a witness, whose prejudices or interests in- 
cline him to the evidence he gives. If these gen- 
tleman had found any way to escape the conclu- 
sion tliat the early christians stood in an attitude 
of expecting the personal coming of Christ, they 
would certainly have availed themselves most 
gladly of an opportunity, at least, to keep silent 
upon the subject. We have nothing to do with 
their opinions, but only with their testimony con- 
cerning the universal belief of the first disciples. 

Thus we are iiot compelled to accept the rational- 
istic tendencies of Prof. Harnack, although forced 
to bow to his testimony as a historian, because he 
is everywhere recognized as the ablest patristic 
scholar now living. Evidently he is not in sym- 
pathy with the truth of our Lord's pre-millennial 
coming, but he is obliged as an honest witness to 
place upon record what he has discovered by a 
thorough search into the Christian literature of the 
first centuries. It is scarcely necessary to say that 
inillennium is a Latin word, and chiliad is a 
Greek word, both referring to the thousand years 
when Satan shall be bound, when the righteous 
dead shall be raised, and when shall be fulfilled 
the sweet benediction, " Blessed and holy is he 
that hath part in the first resurrection ; on such the 
second death hath no power, l)ut they shall be 



136 TILL 11 K ("OMK. 



priests of God and of Christ, and shall reigii with 

Ilim a thousand years." Rev. x\:(l 

lu the history of Christianity three main forces are 
found to have acted as auxiliaries of the gospel. They have 
elicited the ardent enthusiasm of many whom the bare 
preaching of the gospel would never have made decided 
converts. These are (1) a belief in the speedy return of 
Christ and in His glorious reign on earth. . . .First in point of 
time came the faith in the nearness of Christ's second advent 
and the establishing of His reign of glory on the earth. In- 
deed it appears so early that it migh" be questioned whether 
it ought not to be regarded as an essential part of the Chris- 
tian religion. 

He then quotes from a nunil)er of men who 

labored with the apostles, or were their immediate 

successors in the ofhce of preaching the gospel, 

all going to show that it may still he questioned 

whether the Lord's personal and pre-millennial 

return to the earth may not be regarded as an es- 

sent'al part of the Christian religion. 

That a philosopher like Justin, with a bias towards an 
Hellenic construction of the Christian religion, should iiever- 
theless have accepted its chiliastic elements, is the strongest 
proof that these enthusiastic expectations were inseparably 
bound up with the Christain faith down to the middle of the 
2d century. And another proof is found in the fact that 
even a speculative Jewish Christian like Cerinthus not only 
did not renounce the chiliastic hope, but pictured the future 
kingdom of Christ as a kingdom of sensual pleasures, of 
eating and drinking and marriage festivities. 

After the middle of the 2d century these expectations 
were gradually thrust into the background. They would 
never have died out, however, had not circumstances altered, 
and a new mental attitude been taken up. The spirit of 
philosophical and theological speculation and of ethical re- 
flection, which began to spread through the churches, did 
not know what to make of the old hopes of the future. So 
early as the year 170, a church partv in Asia Minor — the so- 
called Alogi — rejected the whole body of apocalyptic writ- 
ings and denounced the Apocalypse of John as a book of 
fables. All the more ])Owerful was the reaction. In the so- 
called Montanistic controversy (A. I). 100-220), one of the 



WITNESSES TO THE HOT»R. 137 

principal issues involved was the continuance of the chilias- 
tic expectations in the churches. .. .After the INIontanistic 
controversy, chiliastic views were more and more discredited 
in the Greek Church; they were, in fact, stigmatized as 
"Jewish" and consequently "lieretical." It was the Alex- 
andrian theology that superseded them; that is to say, Neo- 
Platonic mysticism triumphed over the early Christian hope 
of the future, first among the " cultured," and then, when 
thetheology of the "cultured" had taken the faith of the 
" uncultured " under its protection, amongst the latter also. 

Just SO. Tlie spirit of pliilosopliical and tlieo- 
logical speculation and of ethical reflection, and 
Neo-Platonic niysticisiu patronized l)y the cultured, 
are enougli to kill all faith, not ouly in the com- 
ing of Christ, Init in Christ Himself. This is the 
trouble with the church of the present day, and 
unless it gives up the folly, it will drift, as the 
church did after surrendering the hope of the Lord's 
coming, into the dark ages. Philosophical and 
theological speculation, and ethical reflection, and 
Neo-Platonic mysticism and culture are choking 
the life out of the professing people of God; and 
the devil stands by laughing. 

But the AVestern Church w^as also more conservative than 
the Greek. Her theologians had, to begin with, little tu- n 
for mystical speculation; their tendency was rather to reduce 
the gospel to a system of morals. Now for the morality 
chiliasm had a special significance as the one distinguishing 
feature of the gospel, and the only thing that gave a specifi- 
cally Christian character to their system. This, however, 
holds good of the Western theologians only after the middle 
of the 3d cen.ury. The earlier fathers, Irena^us, Hipollytus, 
Tertullian, believed in chiliasm simply because it was a part 
of the tradition of the church, and because Marcion and the 
Gnostics would have nothing to do with it. Hipollytus, al- 
though an opponent to Montanism, v^as nevertheless a 
thorough-going millennarian. Tertullian aimed at a more 
spirtual conception of the millennial blessings than Papias 
had, but he still adhered, especially in the Montanistic per- 
iod, to all the acient anticipations. It is the same all through 
the 3d and 4th centuries with those Latin theologians who 



138 



TiT.L UK ro]\rK. 



escaped the iufluence of Greek speculation. CommodiaD, 
Victorinus Pattavensis, Lactantius and Sulpicius iSeverus, 
were all pronounced millennarians, the clearest evi- 
dence that in the West miilennarianism was still a point of 
" orthodoxy " in the 4th century. 

Prof. Ilariiack attributes the ovei'tlirow of the 
early faith to the great influence of Augustine, 
who at one time hekl it. 

But the signs of the times pointed to a different prospect. 
Without any miraculous interposition of God, not only was 
Christianity victorious on earth, but the church had attained 
a position of supremacy. The old Roman empire was totter- 
ing to its fall; the church stood fast, ready to step into the 
inheritance. It was not simply that the world-power, the 
enemy of Christ, had been vanquishec' ; the fact as that it had 
gradually abdicated its political functions in favor of the 
church. [Alas! how true.]. . . . How milh nnarianism never- 
theless found its way, with the help of apocalyptic mystic- 
isms and Anabaptist influences, into tlie churches of the 
Reformation, chiefly among the Reformed sects, but after- 
ward, also in the Lutheran church, how it became incorpor- 
ated with Pietism, how in recent time an exceeding mild 
type of "academic " chiliasm 7i«s been developed from a be- 
lief in the verbal inspiration of the Bible^ how finally new 
sects are springing up here and there with apocalyptic and 
chiliastic expectations, — these are matters which cannot be 
entered upon here. Bi.t one remark ought to be made in 
conclusion. A genuine and living revival of chiliastic hopes 
is always a sign that the church at large has become secular 
ized to such a degree that tender consciences can no longer 

feel sure of their faith within her The claims of chiliasm 

are sufficiently met by the acknowledgment that in former 
times it was, associated — to all appearance inseparably asso- 
ciated — with the gospel itself. 

After this testimony of Prof. Harnack it scarcely 
seems necessary to cite other witnesses. He says 
of the early faith in the nearness of Christ's second 
advent, and the estahlishingof His reign of glory on 
the earth, ^' it might be questioned whetlier it ouglit 
not to be regarded as an essential part of the Chris- 
tian religion," and "it was associated — to all ajv 
pearance inseparably associated — with the gospel 



WITNESSES TO THE IIOTE, 139 

itself." He would make no siicli statement unless 
compelled to do so by the facts, and no man will 
dispute his authority. 

Neaiuler, referring to the faith of the early 
Christians that the church would come forth tri- 
umphant out of its conflicts, says, "They could at 
first, as we have before remarked, conceive of it no 
otherwise than this, that the struggle between the 
church and the pagan state would endure till the 
triumph l^rought about from ^NiXliowiJ) y the return 
of Christ to Jiidg7)ienty Vol. I, p. 650. 

Mosheim, referring to the controversies in the 
time of Origen, says, "Long before this period an 
opinion had prevailed that Christ was to come and 
reign a thousand years among men, before the en- 
tire and final dissolution of this world. This opin- 
ion, which had hitherto met with no opposition,''^ 
etc. Yol. I, p. 89. 

Hagenbach, says, " The disciples of Christ, hav- 
ing received from their Master the promise of His 
second coming (parousia), the first Christians 
looked upon this event as near at hand, in connec- 
tion with the general resurrection of the dead and 
the final Judgment." 

Dorner says, as quoted in Hagenbach's History 
of Doctrines, " The Christian hope in the Christ 
that was to come grew out of faith in the Christ, 
who had already come," and adds, "Justin, writing 
at the time of Papis, says that it was the general 
faith of all. orthodox Christians, and that only 
^Gnostics did not share it." 

Giesler, also quoted by Hagenbach, says of the 
first tvo centuries, " In all the works of this period 
iiiillennarianism is so prominent, we cannot Jiesi- 



140 TILL HE COME. 



tate to consider it as universal in an age when 
snch sensuous motives were certainly not unneces- 
sary to animate men to suffer for Christianity." 
Yol. I, p. 215. 

Dr. Schaff says, in his llistoi-y of the Christian 
Church, " The most striking point in the eschatol- 
ogy of the ancient church is the widely current and 
very prevalent chiliasm, or the doctrine of a visible 
reign of Christ in glory on the earth with the 
risen saints for a thousand years." Yol. I, p. 299. 

Bishop Renshaw says, "The commonly received 
opinion of a spiritual millennium, consisting in a 
universal triumph of the gospel, and the conver- 
sion of all nations for a thousand years before the 
coming of Christ, is a novel doctrine, unknown to 
the church for the space of sixteen hundred years." 

Prof. Fisher, in The Beginnings of Cliristianity, 
says, " We call attention to the liopes and expecta- 
tions of the apostles respecting the Second Ad- 
vent of Christ, as they are disclosed in the New 
Testament writings This expectation is ex- 
pressed by all apostles in terms which fairly ad- 
mit of no other interpretation. It is found in 
Paul (Rom. xiiiill, 12; 1 Cor. vii:29, 31; x:ii; 
Phil. iv:5; 1 Tim. vi:14) . . . .The same expectation 
is expressed in the Epistle to the Hebrews, (Heb. x: 
25, 37); in the Epistle of James, (v:3, 8); in the 
Epistles of Peter, (1 Pet. iv:7; 2 Pet. iii:3); in 
the Epistle of Jude, (vs. 8); in tlie first Epistle of 
John, (ii:16); and in the Apocalypse, (i;l; iii: 
2; xxii;7, 12, 20). To put any other construction 
on these passages, as if the Parousia to which they 
refer, were anything else than the Second Advent 
oftlie Lord to Judoinent, would inti-odiici^ a danger- 



WITNESSES TO THE HOPE. 141 

ous license in interpretation, and one wliicli might 
l^e employed to snbvert the principal doctrines of 
tlie Christian System." 

But surely it is useless to qnote further. If 
anything can be established by human testimony, 
it is tlie fact that tliosewho are looking for the per- 
sonal comino^ of the Lord, not for theconversion of 
the world l)y the church, are in sympathy with the 
belief and teaching of the apostles and early 
Christians. No one probably Avould be bold 
enough to deny that such was the faith of the dis- 
ciples, who were considered ''Orthodox," for three 
hundred years, a period that has never been 
equalled in the endurance of suffering for Christ's 
sake, and in the activity of missionary zeal. 

Coming to a later period, we find Prof. Briggs, 
utterly and fatally M'rong about the word of God, 
but able and scholarly, instructing the Presbyter- 
ians with reo-ard to the doctrine of their Confes- 
sion of Faith. 

The current doctrine of a millennium in the future before 
the advent of Chris', is another extra-confessional doctrine, 
for which there is no basis in the AVestminister Standards. . 
The Standards express the faith of the universal catholic 
church in looking forward to the advent of Christ for the 
judgment of the risen (?) world as imminent. . . .The current 
doctrine is one for which Daniel Whitby, the Arminian [he 
should have added, the Arian], and the great revival of 
]\Iethodism are chiefly responsible. .. .When recent Presby- 
terian divines go further, and adopt the scheme of the 
Aiminian Wliitbv, they take a position which suits quite 
well with evangelical ]\iethodism, but which is not in accord 
with Cah'iiiisni. They moreover go against the Scriptures, 
which do not recognize any such future millennium as this 
theory professes. 

The doctrine of a future millennium is not so innocent as 
it appears to be on the surface. It changes the faith of 
the cliurch in the imminency of the second advent of Christ. 
It makes the millennium the great hope of the future, in- 



14:2 TILL hp: come. 



stead of the presence of the Redeemer Himself. The Mes- 
siah is the great hope of the church, the supreme object of 
oar living and striving, the Bridegroom for whose presence 
the affian ed bride prays and agonizes. But the current 
theo'ogy pushes the Messiah behind the millennium, and 
fixes the hope of men upon an illusion and a delusion of 
human conceit and folly. 

But as many are consciously or unconsciously 
influenced by the prevailing sentiment about them, 
it may be well to name some prominent men who 
are prominent pre-millennialists, although one 
who is not brave and independent enough to do 
his own thinking, apart from the prevailing senti- 
ment of the time a:id country in which he lives, is 
hardly worth the trouble to help him into the 
light. He will l)e of little account, no matter on 
which side he at last elects to cast his lot. It was 
considered an unanswerable argument by the 
Pliarisees, when Christ came theflrst time, to ask, 
"Have any of the rulers of the Pliarisees be- 
lieved on Him?" Jno. vii:47. So several post- 
millennialists have recently asked concerning His 
second coming, either in stupid ignorance or wil- 
ful prevarication, and it is of importance to show 
that the pre-millennialists are not wanting in 
scholars, expositors and preachers of the linest 
ability, as the world would say. 

A brother, who is thoroughly familiar with 
modern German literature, asserts tliat "there is 
scarcely an expositor of any note on the Continent 
of Europe, who is not an avowed pre-millennialist," 
and adds, '^ let us rejoice tliat the best criticism, 
and Biblical as well as ecclesiastical and theologi- 
cal scholars such as Yan Oosterzee,Christlieb, Yolck, 
Martensen, Weiss, Philippi, Koch, Grau, Olshau- 
sen, Christiani, Godet, have put post-millennial- 



WITNESSES TO THE HOPE. 



143 



ism and lignrativism under their feet." He fol- 
lows tills Avitli a long^list of names as Bengel, Roos, 
Crusius, Hofman, IDelitzseh, Auberlen, Lange, 
Luthardt, Ivoslin, Stier, DaCosta, Cappadose, 
Gaiissen and many others, eminent for their learn- 
ing, who utterly reject the post-millennial heresy, 
and maintain the pre-millennial coming of our 
Lord. This is sometimes called the " continental 
view," but no matter whether it is continental or 
insular so it is the truth of God. 

In Great Britain we have such expositors as 
Alford, Ellicott, Fausset, Tregelles, Greswell, the 
Bishop of Liverpool; such preachers as 0. H. 
Spurgeon, IL Grattan Guinness, Archibald Brown, 
Frank AVhite, Henry Yarley, Baptists; Dr. Hora- 
tius Bonar, Dr. Andrew Bonar, Dr. W. P. 
Mackay, Dr. Adolph Sapliir, Dr. Sinclair Patter- 
son, Dr. Donald Frazer, John Wilkinson, Presby- 
terians; Pev. Prebendary Auriol, Yery Pev. Dean 
Fremantle, Pev. Marcus Painsford, Pev. Canon 
Hoare, Pev. II. E. Brooke, Pev. II. W. Webb- 
Peploe, Pev. C. Skrine, Pev. C. J. Goodhart, Pev. 
Burlington AVale, Pev. J. Stevenson, Church of 
England; the Earl of Shaftesbury, the Earl of 
Cavan, Lord Padstock, Sir Arthur Black wood, to 
say nothing of the entire number of " Brethren " 
like J. :N'. Darby, William Kelly, C. H. Mcin- 
tosh, William Lincoln, J. Denham Smith, J. 
Hudson Taylor, T. Shuldham Henry, B.W. Newton, 
I. B. Baines, Arthur Pridham, embracing some of 
the most thorough scholars and some of the pro- 
foundest students of tlie Bible in tlie world. All 
of these, and scores of others who might be named 



^ 



144 TILL HE Cl^ME. 

have spoken and written niucli in defence of our 
Lord's pre-millennial coming. 

In the United States it is sufficient to remind 
the reader that a pre-millennial conference was 
recently held in Brooklyn, called hy one hundred 
and tifty Baptist ministers. Or it may he suffici- 
ent to mention the names of some who spoke at 
the pre-millennial Conferences in Kew^ York and 
Chicago, or expressed hearty sympathy with the 
doctrine. Bishop Yail, of Kansas, Bishop Bald- 
win, of Cauda, Bishop ]N"icholson, of Philadelphia, 
Dr. S. H. Tyng, \)y. L. W. Bancroft, Dr. R. IS'ew- 
ton, Dr. J. F. Grammer, Episcopal; Prof. J. D, 
Cooper, Prof. D. C. Marquis, Prof. W. G. Moore- 
head, Prof. J. T. Duil^eld, Prof. S. 11. 
Kellogg, Dr. ^\ West, Dr. E. E. Cra- 
ven, Dr. H. M. Parsons, Dr. William DiuAviddle, 
Dr. W. Erdman, Dr. Albert Erdman, Dr. J. 
F. Kendall, Dr. C. K. Imhrie, Dr. A. T. Pierson, 
Presbyterian; Prof. II. Lummis, Prof. E. F. 
Stroeter, Dr. James S. Kennedy, Wm. E. Black- 
stone, Methodist; Dr. A. J. Gordon, Dr. A. J. 
Frost, Dr. F. L. Chapell, Dr. II. M. Saunders, 
liobert Cameron, Baptist; Dr. E. P. Goodwin, Dr. 
H. D. Burton, Dr. Geo. F. Pentecost, Congrega- 
tional; Dr. W. P. Gordon, Dr Geo. S. Bishop, Dr. 
Euf us W. Clark, Reformed Dutch; Dr. Joseph A. 
Seiss, Dr. Geo. N. II. Peters, Lutlierans; Moody, 
Munhall, Needham Whittle, Evangelists; while 
hundreds more coukl ])e mentioned, if necessary. 
It is a great mistake to suppose that pre-mil- 
lenists are but an insigniticant company of cranks. 
They may be cranks, and it is well that they are in 
these days of infidelity among the ]u*ofe.^sors and 



WITNESSES TO THE HOl'E. 145 

preachers, but they are loyal to our Lord Jesus 
Christ, and true to His word. There are thousands 
and tens of thousands of them in Europe and 
America, including the first men of the church in 
intellectual endowments, scholastic attainments, 
fervent piety, faitliful service and intimate acquaint- 
ance with the Scriptures. Indeed it is the study 
of the Scriptures, which has led to such a remark- 
ble revival of the old and true faith in the pre- 
millennial comino; of our Lord. Just as this is 
written a letter is received from a pastor in North 
Dakota, who says, "For some time it has been my 
purpose to procure a lot of suitable books, and in- 
vestigate the subject of the Second Advent of 
Christ. But, my dear brother, I had the book I 
needed at hand. It was the BIBLE. Taking that 
as ' the Supreme Judge, by which all controversies 
of religion are to be determined,' I went at it 
with an honest desire to know the truth. ]N"eed I 
say more? You know where such work must end.'' 
Pre-millennialists, however misrepresented or 
misunderstood, can always sing the song of Moses, 
when brought to face those who reject the truth; 
*'Their rock is not as our Rock,even our enemies them 
selves being judges," Dent. xxxii:31. By far the ablest 
book that has ever appeared against the truth was 
written by Dr. David Brown, already frequently 
mentioned in these pages. To a pre-millennialist 
the admissions he makes are very remarkable from 
his stand point, and would have been all that can 
be demanded, if he had not spoiled them by con- 
tradictory statements. 

Pre-milleDnialists have done the church a real service, by 
calling attention to the place Avhich the second advent holds 



146 TILL HE COME. 



in the word of God and tlie scheme of divine truth. If the 
controversy which they have raised should issue in a fresh 
and impartial inquiry into this branch of it, I for one, instead 
of regretting, shall rejoice in the agitation of it. When they 
dilate upon the prominence given to this doctrine in scrip- 
ture, and the practical uses which are made of it, they touch 
a chord in the heart of every simple lover of his Lord, and 
carry conviction to all who tremble at His word. . . With 
them we affirm that the REDEEMER'S SECOND APPEAR- 
ING IS THE VERY POLE-STAR OF THE CHURCH. 
[The capitals are his own]. That it is so held forth in the 
New Testament is beyond dispute. 

He tells us "there are certain minds which, 
either from constitutional temperament, or the 
particular school of theology to which they are at- 
tached, have tendencies in the direction of pre-mil- 
lennialism so strong that they are ready to embrace 
it almost immediately con mnorey But w^hat sort 
ot minds are they? Cranky, curious, credulous? 
Nay, verily. 

Souls that burn with love to Christ, who with the mother 
of Sisera, cry through the lattice, " Why is his chariot so long 
in coming? Why tarry the wheels of His chariots? " and with 
the spouse, " Make haste, my Beloved, and be Thou like to a 
roe, or a young hart upon the mountains of spices" — such 
souls are ready to catch at a doctrine which eeems to promise 
a much earlier appearing of their beloved Lord than the or- 
dinary view . . . But are there no a?^^!^■-pre-millennial 
tendencies which require to be guarded against? I think 
there are. Under the influence of such tendencies, the in- 
spired text, as such presents no rich and exhaustless field of 
prayerful and delighted investigation; exegetical inquiries 
and discoveries are an uncongenial element; and whatever 
scripture intimations regarding the future destinies of the 
church and of the world involve events out of the usual 
range of human occurrences, or exceeding the anticipations 
of enlightened Christian sagacity, are almost instinctively 
overlooked or softened down. 

One would tliink it well to be found in the first 
of those two companies, not in the second, espec- 
ially since Dr. Brown assures us tliat we should 



WITNESSES TO THE HOPE. 147 

never be satisfied with anything less than the per- 
sonal comincr of our Lord. 

o 
Would it be incongruous in the church to mourn and feel 
desolate in the presence of her Lord? Not less incongruous, 
it seems, is it not to cherish the feeling of desolation in His 
absence. And both are such incongruities as confounding the 
seasons of fasting and feasting, as putting a piece of new 
garment upon an old, as putting new wine into old bottles, 
and preferring new wine to o d. . . . Jesus will think it 
an abuse of His consolations if we have learned from them 
to do without him. Written communications and tokens of 
affection from the absent One are dear to affection — but onl}^ 
when Himself cannot be had. Christ's word, and the seals 
of His love conveyed to our hearts by the blessed Spirit, are 
inexpressibly dear to His loving people — but only in the ab- 
sence of Himself. And never do we please Christ so much 
as when we " refuse to be comforted," even with His own 
consolations, save in the prospect of His Personal Return. 
[The italics are his]. 

But let it not l)e imagined that the truth, al- 
thougli supported hy divine authority and sus- 
tained by liuuiau authority, will prevail "till He 
come." Oidy a line of witnesses to tlie blessed 
hope will be kept up, and this is all. Tlie apostasy has 
set ill, and has come to stay. Of course God could 
revive His "work in tlie midst of the years, in the 
midst of the years make known, in wrath remem- 
ber mercy," and if it please the Lord still to tarry, 
this He must do, or " all will come to desolation." 
Quite a number of godly men, who are post-mil- 
leimialiftts, clearly see and deeply deplore tlio 
wretched condition of the professing Christian 
body, and frankly confess that the extraordinary 
manifestation of divine grace and power is abso- 
lutely necessary to save from impending ruin, and 
to call the chureli back to the gospel. But the prolv 
ability i?^ very great that we are hemmed in by 
the pei'ils of the last davs, and hence the wit- 



148 TILL HE COME. 



nesses can do nothing more in the midnight dark- 
ness than to cry, "Beiiold the Bridegroom coni- 
eth." Matt. XXX :t>. 

"Bride of the Lamb, awake! awake! 

Why sleep for sorrow now? 
The hope of glory, Christ, is thine, 

An heir of glory thou. 
Thy spirit, through the Icnely night, 

From earthly joy apart, 
Hath sigh'd for one that's far away — 

The Bridegroom of thy heart. 

But see, the night is waning fast. 

The breaking morn is near; 
And Jesus comes, with voice of love. 

Thy drooping heart to cheer. 
He comes — for, oh ! His yearning heart 

No more can bear delay — 
To scenes of full unmingled Joy 

To call His Bride away. 

Thou, too, Shalt reign — He will not wear 

His crown of joy alone! 
And earth His royal Bride shall see 

Beside Him on the throne. 
Then weep no more — 'tis all thine own— = 

His crown, His joy divine, 
And, sweeter far than all beSide, 



THE ORDER OF EVENTS. 149 



CHAPTER XIY. 

THE OKDER OF EVENTS. 

^^TTTHEIS" the Most High divided to the 
V V nations their inlieritance, when lie 
separated the sons of Adam, He set the bounds 
of the people according to the number of the 
children of Israel." Deut. xxxii:8. Perhaps most 
professing Christians would hear with a smile of 
derision or incredulity, that, in the distribution of 
the earth's surface among various nationalities. He 
had special reference to a people so few and des- 
pised as the Jews, and not to the great powers, 
like the Grecian, Ttoman, Russian, Gerirmn, and 
British empires, and the proud Republic of the 
United States. Nevertheless it is a fact, and a 
fact we will do well to keep in mind when we search 
the Scriptures of truth. 

It was to the Jews He said, "Ye have seen what 
I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on 
eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself. ISTow 
therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep 
my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure 
unto me above all people: for all the earth is 
mine, and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, 
and an holy nation." Ex. xix:4-6. Alas! Scarcely 
had " alL the people answered with one voice, and 
said, All the words which the Lord hath said will 
we do," ratifying the covenant wdth blood, before 
they sneered at Moses, and made them a molten 



150 TILL HE COME. 



calf to worship. Ex. xxir:3-8; xxxii:l-4. From 
that time and onward, their history was stained 
with disobedience, idolatry, unbelief and worldli- 
ness, until infinite patience could endure no longer, 
and they were disowned and rejected, and scattered 
among the nations of the earth. 

In the year 722 before Christ the ten tribes, 
that had revolted from the house of David under 
Solomon's successor, were carried away to Assyria, 
and the land was possessed by other people. In 
the year 586 before Clirist Jerusalem was destroyed 
by Nebuchadnezzar, and to this day remains under 
the hand of its Gentile masters. Hence, for 2500 
years Israel has been tlie nation without a home, 
the nation of weary foot like the Wandering Jew, 
the nation wdiich even professedly Christian nations 
have delighted to persecute and torture. For 
nearly eighteen hundred years after the Son of God 
came into the world, kings and cabinets, pretend- 
ing at least to have some regard for His teachings, 
have inflicted upon the hated decendants of Abra- 
ham, and Isaac, and Jacob banishment, extortion, 
oppression, outrage, murder, and all manner of 
cruelty. Even now, at the close of the nineteenth 
century, with its boasted civilization and progress, 
Kussia, Roumania, Bulgaria, Germany, and many 
other peoples think it right to molest and rob, and 
exile, and kill a Jew. 

" The wild dove hath its nest, the fox its cave, 
Mankind its country, Israel but the grave." 

The same inspired and infallible v^ord, how- 
ever, which plainly and frequently predicts their 
dispersion and ])unishment, just as plainly and 



TiiK ori)p:u of events. 151 

much more frequently predicts their restoration to 
their own land, when and where they shall looh 
upon Him whom they pierced, and at last accept 
Him as their long-promised Messiah. Zech. xii:10. 
No Christian wlio helieves that "the prophecy 
came not in old time [or at any time] hy the will 
of man; but holy men of God spake as they were 
moved by the Holy Ghost," 2 Pet. i:21, can have 
a shadow of doubt concerning the future gather- 
ing of the now scattered Israelites into their own 
country, if he also believes tliat the Holy Ghost 
said what he meant, and meant what He said. 

Meanwhile " the times of the Gentiles," set in 
when Israel was set aside, and Babylon was the 
head of the new order of thino;s described in the 
prophecy through Daniel. It is remarkable that 
from near the beginning of the second chapter to 
the close of the seventh, the Holy Ghost writes ' in 
the Chaldee language, as if He would say to the 
Gentiles, read in your own venacular the charac- 
teristic features of your times and your fearful 
fall. Chapter ii shows us Gentile estimate of 
governmental power, as seen in the stately image of 
l^ebuchadnezzer's dream. Chapter iii shows us 
Gentile ambition, as seen in the golden image, 
reared nineteen years later by the king of Babylon. 
Chapter iv shows us Gentile pride saying, "Is not 
this great Babylon that I have built?" and then 
degraded to the level of the beasts in the person of 
the boastful king. Chapter v shows us Gentile im- 
piety and revelry and sensuality, profaning the 
sacred vessels of God's house, until the fingers of a 
man's hand wrote its doom over against the can- 
dlestick upon tlie wall of the king's palace. Chap- 



152 TILL HE COME. 



ter vi shows iis Gentile ])lasplieniy, making man 
an object of worship, as in the days of the Anti- 
christ. Cliapter vii shows ns Gentile persecntion 
of the saints, nnder the Antichrist, until Jesus 
comes. 

In other words, dominion or government in the 
hands of Gentiles Avill prove as complete a failure 
as it did in the hands of the Israelites; and if it 
he said that we liave in this age the word of God, 
and the presence of the Spirit to restrain men from 
evil, let us not forget what was written concerning 
His people in former times; "Yea, they made 
their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should 
hear the law, and tlie words which the Lord of 
hosts sent by His Spirit tlirough the former pro- 
phets : therefore came a great wrath from the Lord 
of hosts." Zech. vii:12. Men sin against more 
light and mercy in our day, and, therefore will be 
held to a stricter accountability and overtaken by 
a sorer punishment. 

It has been previously shown by the sure testi- 
mony of God that the present age must close in 
universal apostasy and lawlessness. It shall be as 
when the flood came and destroyed them all. It 
shall be as when Lot was hurried out of Sodom. 
Antichrist shall be manifested in all his blasphemy 
and malignant hatred ot the true Christ. " In the 
last days perilous times shall come." Perhaps no 
religious book printed during the present genera- 
tion has received more universal approval than 
Bernard's " Progress of Doctrine in the New Testa- 
ment." 

Di\ Alvah Llovey, of the Newton Theological 
Institution, who introduced it to the American 



THE ORDER OF EVENTS. 153 

public, said, " The Baiiiptoii Lectures of Mr. Ber- 
nard on tlie Progress of Doctrine in the New Tes- 
tament, deserve nnqualitied commendation, for 
they are as nearly perfect, botli in substance and 
form, as any human production can well be made." 

This, no doubt, expresses the view of intelligent 
ministers and Christians of all denominations; for 
no one, so far as known, has been found to dissent 
from its statements. It is well, therefore, to read 
attentively what this remarkable expositor has to 
say concerning the end of onr dispensation. 

I know not liow any man, in closini^ the Epistles, ccild 
expect to find the subsequent history of the Church essen- 
tially ditfereut from wliat it is. In those writings we seem, as 
it were, not to witness some passing storms which clear the air, 
but to feel the whole atmosphere charged with the elements 
of future tempest and death. Every moment the forces of 
evil show themselves more plainly. They are encountered, 
but not dissipated. Or, to cliange the figure, we see battles 
fought by the leaders of our band, but no security is promis- 
ed by their victories. New assaults are being prepared; 
new tactics will be tried; new enemies pour on; the distant 
hills are black with gathering multitudes, and the last ex- 
hortations of those wiio fall at their posts call on their suc- 
cessors to "endure hardness as good soldiers of Jesus 
Christ," and " earnestly to contend for the faith which was 
once delivered to the saints." 

The fact which I observe is not merely that these indica- 
tions of the future are in the Epistles, but that they increase 
as we approach the close, and after the doctrines of the Gos- 
pel have been fully wrought out, and the fulness of personal 
salvation and the ideal character of the church has been 
placed in the clearest light, the shadows gather and deepen 
on the external history. The last words of St, Paul in 
the second Epistle to Timothy, and those of St. Peter in his 
second Epistle, with the Epistles of St. John and St, Jude, 
breathe the language of a time in which the tendencies of 
that history had distinctly shown themselves; and in this 
respect these writings form a prelude and a passage to the 
Apocalypse. 

Of the general meaning of the Apocalypse he 
writes truly as follows, the italics being his own: 



I5ti: TILL HE COME. 



The book is a doctrine of the power and coming of our 
Lord Jesus Christ, " Behold he cometh with clouds, and 
every eve shall see him." That is the first voice, and the 
keynote of the whole. The Epistles to the Seven Churches 
(symbolical representatives of the whole Church in it^ vari- 
ous conditions) all take their tone from this thought, and are 
the voice of a Lord who will " come quickly." The visions 
which follow^ draw^ to the same end, and the last voices of 
the book respond to the first, and attest its subject and its 
purpose. " He which testifieth these things saith, surely I 
come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus." What- 
ever else the Christian desires is bound up in this prospect. 
The deliverance of the creation from its present groans and 
travail, the redemption of our body, the perfection of man in 
a holy community, and the realization in outward things of 
the tendencies o+' the renewed nature, all these hopes w^ait on 
the one hope of Hia appearing. 

If this is so, and perhaps none will dispute it, 
how strange it seems that the hope of His ap- 
pearing has no place in the thought or discourse of 
a vast niajority of Christians! Men speak of dy- 
ino- and going to heaven, but how few of the com- 
ing of the Lord ? Such indifference is no doubt 
due to the artifice of Satan, who, as Calvin says, ''in 
plucking up the faith of Christ's coming, aims di- 
rectly at the throat of the church." It is not 
death that is set before us, horrible death, loath- 
some death, with its frequent preliminary agonies 
and pangs and tortures, that make the suffering of 
a martyr by fire as nothing in comparison, but it is 
the coming of the Lord to destroy death. Dr. 
James Culross, the author of many valuable books, 
and one of the ablest of Eno-lish writers, has well 
expressed the truth on this subject 

No reflecting man can think lightly of death or drive it 
from his contemplation. But in our religious speech we 
have too often placed it where the Bible does not place it, 
and have caused it to intercept and in a measure hide from 
view the coming of the Lord. Taking what we find in the 
New Testament, the true Christian attitude is that of wait- 



THE ORDER OF E\ENTS, 



ing for the Lord from lieaveii. ... He is to return iu 
power and great glory, having received the Kingdom. Tiiere 
is nothing that meets us more distinctly and largel}' iu the 
New Tes.ameut than this. We cannot "spiritualize "' it. We 
may as well " spiritualize " His resureftion and ascension. 

It is not merely that i)rophets and apostles have told us 

of His return; He has done so Himself, and that not merely 
by way of bare prediction or intimation of his purpose, but 
by way of promise. Were He not to return He would break 
liis word. The promise meets us again and again, and in 
the greatest variety of form. 

First, He will come in person. '' This same Jesus, 
wliicli is taken up from you into lieaven, shall so 
come in like manner, as ye liave seen 11 im go into 
lieaven." Acts i:ll. "The Lord Himself shall de- 
scend from heaven with a sliout." 1 Thess. iv:16. 
This does not mean an angel, nor the Holy Spirit, 
nor deatli, nor any providential event whatever, 
but the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, wlio summons 
His o\vn believino; and saved ones to meet Him, "that 
every one may receive the things done through his 
body." 2 Cor. v: 10; that He may "know how 
much every man had gained by trading." Luk. 
xix:15; that He may " give every man according 
as his work shall be." Rev. xxii:12. With this 
judgment scene tlie unbelieving world has nothing 
to do, but only the saints who are assigned their 
position in tlie kingdom according to their faithful- 
ness, and of whom it is said, "Do ye not know that 
the saints shall judge the world?" 1 Cor. vi:2. 

Second, He may come at any day, for there is 
no predicted event that awaits fulfillment between 
this passing moment, and His coming for His 
people to gather them about Himself in the air. 
The popular view that the world is first to be con- 
verted is a most delusive dream, for which tlie re is 
not the slightest warrant in tlie word of God, in 



15G TILL HE COME. 



the history of the church, or in the present outlook. 
The view probably arose from the hideous lie of 
evolution, it being assumed that there is an in- 
herent tendency in human nature to reach a higher 
development, or, as poor Beecher used to say, after 
he became an evolutionist and infidel, " man has 
been failing upward ever since his creation." If 
this is true, and the evil and vulo-ar beast has 
made no nobler attainment than that which we see 
at the close of the nineteenth century, he must 
have had a mighty low start. His tendency is not 
toward a higher development in religion and mor- 
als, but he w411 gravitate towards the devil, so that 
the last days will be the worst days, as the Scrip- 
tures plainly teach. 

Third, at the coming of the Lord for His saints 
there shall be a resurrection of all who " sleep in 
Jesus," and of none others. "Blessed and holy is 
he that hath part in the first resurrection ; on such 
the second death hath no power, l^ut they shall be 
priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with 
Him a thousand years." Rev. xx:6. The common 
interpretation, that this refers to the revival of 
martyr principles, is a self-evident absurdity, for 
while we may think, in a figure of speech, of prin- 
ciples being kings, or reigning, it is impossible to 
conceive of principles as priests of God. Alford 
well says on' these words, " Those who lived next 
to the apostles, and the whole church for 300 
years, understood them in the plain, literal sense," 
and he adds, that unless so accepted, " there is an 
end of all significance in language, and Scripture 
is wij:>ed out as a definite testimony to anything." 

Even if there is a simultaneous resurrection of 



THE ORDER OF EVENTS. 157 

the righteous and iiiiriDrhteous at the comingr of 
the Lord, there is the most marked difference be- 
tween them, for only the former liave bodies that 
are glorilied, incorruptible, and shining in the 
likeness of the Redeemer. This is the resurrec- 
tion for which Paul panted and strove, " the out- 
resurrection, the one from among the dead," Phil. 
iii:ll; and it is unaccountable that the apostle 
earnestly desired, if by any means he might attain 
unto a resurrection common to all, and unavoid- 
able. So our Lord tells us about "the resurrec- 
tion of the just," Lu. xiv:14; and speaks of those 
who '^t?hall be accounted woi'thy to obtainthat world, 
and the resurrection from the dead," or "the res- 
urrection which is from amoiig the dead," as 
Rotherham properly renders it, Lii. xx:36. Even 
the Old Testament teaches this elective resurrec- 
tion, peculiar to the saints, when it says, "Many 
of them that sleep in the dust of the earth sliaJl 
awake, these [that awake] to everlasting life, and 
those [that awake not] to shame and everlasting 
contempt," Dan. xii:2. In the great Xew Testa- 
ment chapters wliich treat -of the resurrection, not 
a word is said concerning the resurrection of the 
unbelievers, but only of the saints, 1 Cor. xv; 1 
Thess, iv:13-18. Surely "there shall be a resur- 
rection of the dead, both of the just and the un- 
just," Actsxx:15; but only of the just at the 
coming of Christ. "But the rest of the dead lived 
not again until the thousand years were finished." 
Rev. XX :5. 

Fourth, the true church, the regenerated ones, hav- 
ing been caught away, a foul and apostate religious 
system Avill b'^ left, associated with the Antichrist, 



158 



TILL HE COME. 



Avhose rise and progress are symbolized in the Seal 
judgments of the Apocalypse, the first three and a 
half years of his reign in the Trumpet judgments, 
and the last three and a lialf years in the Yial 
judgments, the overthrow of Babylon, or all that 
exalts itself against Clod, both in its ecclesiastical 
and political aspect, being depicted in the seven - 
teenth and eighteenth chapters of that marvelous 
book. Tlie Jews shall have been partially restored 
to their own land in unbelief, and there pass 
through the great tribulation, such as was not 
since the beginning of tlie world, when the Lord 
Jesus Christ will suddenly appear with all His 
saints, to deliver His people from their distress, 
to cast the Antichrist and the false prophet alive 
into the lake of fire burning with brimstone, and 
to establish His millennial kingdom. Zech. xiv:l- 
5; Rev. xix:16-21. 

Fifth, when He appears again in the midst of 
Israel, when He buikls again the tabernacle of 
David, which is fallen down, Joel ii: 27-32; Acts 
XV. 16, 17, then shall He pour out His Spirit up- 
on all flesh, and the knowledge of His glory shall 
flood the earth, as the waters cover the sea, Hab. 
ii. 14. In that day, and not before, " the inhabi- 
tant shall not say, I am sick; the people that 
dwell therein shall be forgiven their iniquity," 
Isa xxxiii. 24; " Thy people also shall be all right- 
eous: they shall inherit the land forever, the 
branch of my planting, the Avork of my hands, 
that I maybe glorified," Isalx. 21; ''and they 
shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and 
every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord; 
for they shall all know me, from the least of theiu 



THE ORDER OF EVENTS. 159 

unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord ; for I 
will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember 
their sin no more," Jer. xxxi. 34. " And the 
Lord shall be King over all the earth: in that day 
shall there be one Lord, and His name one." 
Zech. xiv. 9. 

Sixth, " When the thousand years are expired, 
Satan shall be loosed outof his prison, the bottom- 
less abyss in which he has been bound during the 
Millennium, and shall go out to deceive the 
nations, in a last desperate effort to thwart the 
counsels of God. But he shall not succeed, for 
he shall be cast into the lake of tire and brimstone, 
wliere the Antichrist and false prophet are, his 
seventh and final defeat and fall. After the jndg- 
ment of the great wliite throne, death and hades, 
thank God, sliall be cast into the lake of fire. But 
what a picture does this give to us of the mind of 
-the flesh, that, even after the blessedness and the 
glory of the Millennial reign, it can be corrupted, 
and lift itself again in insolent defiance. of divine 
authority and infinite love. 

Seventh, eternity begins. " And God shall 
wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there 
shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, 
neither shall there be any more pain: for the for- 
mer things are passed away .... And there shall be 
no more curse: but the throne of God and the 
Lamb shall be in it; and His servants shall serve 
Him: and they shall see His face; and His name 
shall be in their foreheads. And there shall be no 
night there: and they need no candle, neither light 
of the sun; for the Lord God givetli them light: 
and they shall reign for ever and ever .... He 



160 



TILL HE ClOME. 



which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come 
quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus." 
Rev. xxi. 4; xxii. 3-5, 20. 

" I am waiting for the dawning 
Of the bright and blessed day; 
When the darksome night of sorrow 
Shall have vanished far away : 
When for ever with the Saviour, 
Far beyond this vale of tears, 
I shall swell the song of worship 
Through the everlasting years. 

I am looking at the brightness, 
(See, it shineth from afar,) 
Of the clear and joyous beaming, ^ 

Of the "Bright and Morning Star "; 
Through the dark grey mist of morning 
Do I see its glorious light; 
Then away with every shadow 
Of this sad and weary night. 

I am waiting for the coming 

Of the Lord who died for me: 

Oh! His words have thrilled my spirit, 

"I will come again for thee." 

I can almost hear His footfall 

On the threshold of the door. 

And my heart, my heart is longing 

To be His for evermore." 



A1 



